moesnotifs

[moesnotifs]

daylight | 1. black and white

pairing: no-outbreak!sheriff!joel miller x f!pregnant!reader

chapter summary: It was supposed to be a normal day. What happened to his normal damn day?

warnings: implied abuse (reader), implied parental neglect (reader), implied character death, descriptions of injuries on a pregnant woman (reader), descriptions of grief, age gap (joel is 48 and reader is 28), a little bit of a slow burn, reader is pregnant, eventual POV swapping but this time it’s all joel, small town gossip, this small town does not apply HIPAA because they’re borderline feral

word count: 7.8k

a/n: welcome to the very first chapter of daylight!!! this chapter is very joel-heavy, but i promise that next chapter we’ll get more of a glance into reader’s brain and what the hell is going on with her. next chapter should be up sometime in the next couple weeks (but obviously with my track record, who knows).

series masterlist | next chapter ->

read on ao3

“Ellie! What’re you doin’? You’re gonna be late for school!”

It’s 7:58. She should already be at school, but she’s not. He can’t even remember the last time that she was on time for school.

He takes a sip of coffee from his green mug with a picture of a little mug in front of a striped wall holding a placard that reads “MUGSHOT”– a gift from Ellie for his last birthday. He loves coffee. October is perfect weather for it. The revitalizing liquid warms up his frozen fingers through the ceramic and slides down his throat like heaven. He loves coffee.

Footsteps pound down the hallway and all he sees of his teenager is a blur of green plaid as she rushes past the entryway to the kitchen and to the front door.

“Hi Joel! Bye Joel,” she yells, hand popping into his view with a wave and quickly disappearing.

“Hey! Get back in here right now,” he shouts.

“What,” she pants, coming back to the entryway with one shoe on and the other dangling by the laces from her mouth, her tawny hair in a floppy, loose ponytail. Good god, he has no idea how this child has no manners at all. He knows she was not raised like this. Sixteen-year-olds should know not to put shoelaces in their mouths.

But all he does is grumble like he always does because it’s too damn early in the morning and he doesn’t want to argue with her when he’s this damn tired. He can’t think when it’s this early. “Take a poptart please. I don’t want people thinkin’ I starve you.”

She throws her hands up in the air and snatches the silver package off the table. “Okay, Jesus!”

Ellie already has her other shoe on before Joel can even blink. He hears the telltale squeak of the front door opening.

“Have a good day at school!”

“Whatever, Joel!”

And then the door slams shut, the cold October wind rushing its way in behind her.

He takes another sip of his coffee. If he gets another call from the principal lecturing him about Ellie’s tardiness, he might lose his mind. He cannot stand the sound of that man’s voice in his ear– it’s like nails on a chalkboard or the sound of a fork scraping on someone’s teeth. He just wants a normal day with no emergencies or stupid antics from his teenager.

He finishes his coffee off, rinses his cup out, and places it in the sink. 

A normal fucking day.

When he walks into the sheriff’s office, he is greeted by Mary– the nice old lady who works the front desk. Her graying hair is pinned up into curls like she came right out of the 50s and she’s wearing a simple blue dress that compliments her maternal curves with a flair.

“Morning, Sheriff!”

He gives her a polite smile like he does every morning. “Mornin’, Mary. How’s the family?”

“Good! Earl is getting a promotion tomorrow! He’s gonna be the manager over at the hardware store.”

“Oh, that’s great! Tell Earl I said congrats.”

“I will, Sheriff.”

He makes his way to his office, which is all the way at the back of the department to avoid talking to people as much as possible. He passes multiple people along his way back, the woman who keeps track of their files, one of the three beat cops in town, who he greets mildly. He passes his brother’s desk, which is empty save for the steaming mug of tea sitting on his “World’s Best Dad” coaster. He’s somewhere around here.

And, of course, as Tommy often does, he has invaded Joel’s space.

Joel leans against the entryway to his office and clears his throat.

Tommy’s sitting at Joel’s desk with his feet propped up and a hand over his eyes. For a second, he’s almost convinced that he’s asleep, but after a second of impatiently waiting, Tommy speaks up.

“Bill called.”

Jackson, Wyoming is too small for its own good. You can walk from one end of town to the other in thirty minutes or less, and everyone knows everyone and every bit of each other’s business whether they like it or not. Being the sheriff in a small town is easy in most respects– nobody’s getting murdered and there’s hardly ever any robberies– but when it came to Bill Brown, there were times he wished he hadn’t rallied for this job so hard.

Joel sighs and walks into the room, “Why?” He picks his stetson up off his head and smacks it onto his desk beside Tommy’s feet which makes him jump and place a hand over his heart dramatically.

Tommy shrugs after he gives himself a moment to recover, wide eyes pointed at his brother, “Says a ‘dangerous’ woman broke into his property.”

That could mean any number of things with Bill: it could mean that there really is a dangerous woman on his property, it could mean that a woman was walking their dog too closely to his yard, it could mean that a saleswoman knocked on his door to sell him solar panels. Bill is beyond paranoid, but Tommy sitting on his ass, not responding to his call probably means it’s nothing. He’ll check anyway, because if he doesn’t, Bill will come to the station later to get on his ass about it.

“Which property?”

“Old Betty’s place.”

What would anyone want to do with Betty’s house? She didn’t leave anything important laying in that house. It was just a glorified grandmother-themed Ikea after her lawyer had distributed all the things she had left in her will.

“Okay. I guess I’ll go see what’s up.”

The drive over to Betty’s is familiar. The gravel road that knocks his truck around winds him through the dense forest that surrounds the land that Betty Loving called home her entire life. The trees are a mesmerizing mix of reds, oranges, yellows, and greens that come together to highlight the tiny, white cottage that sits on top of the wooded hill.

Without thinking, he knocks the secret rhythm that only a few know onto the tall, white door. He’s stood here on this porch more times than he can count, but in the last few years, he’s avoided even thinking about it. It’s just not the same.

He’s pulled into the house by the collar of his brown button-up with a quick force.

“Bill, what the hell is wrong with–”

“Shhh!” Bill puts a finger up to his lips, scraggly mustache parted by his pudgy finger. 

Said finger points towards Betty’s bedroom at the end of the hall, the one with the pink floral wreath on it that reads, “Elizabeth” in curly script.

Oh god, maybe something really is wrong. He didn’t notice the front door being jammed in any way, nor does he see any damage in his peripheral, but maybe the damage was contained to her room. He really hopes that she didn’t break any of Betty’s trinkets.

“She in there?”

Bill nods his head adamantly, eyes wide.

Joel sighs out his nerves and puts on a brave face. He has to be ready for whatever he’s about to see in there. All he knows is that there is a trespasser that could be dangerous, he’s not sure. He can’t hear anything, in fact it’s eerily quiet.

He pulls out his gun from its holster on his hip. He rarely does it– it’s mostly just a prop to scare drunks from acting too crazy at the bar or one of his fellow officers from being too violent with their own weapons. The metal of the gun lays familiar in his shaking hands.

He pads down the carpeted hall with a practiced patience, boots softly scraping the tops of the fibers. Even as he approaches the door, he still can’t hear anything. Maybe his knock scared them off?

Placing his hand on the cold doorknob, he can feel wind blowing through the bottom crack of the door. Weird, considering it was 50 degrees this morning. She must have gotten through the window. He opens the door.

Laying on Betty’s frilly bedding is a young woman, probably late twenties or early thirties. Your eye is swollen and a dark shade of purple, but it’s fading into yellow around the edges. You’re wearing a long tan coat and a gray sweater dress that shows off the obvious curve of your stomach, hair splayed out underneath you in a halo. What he can see of your fingers and legs are covered in bruises and small cuts of their own. You look like a renaissance painting, splayed out over the bed like a star with your high-heeled boots dangling off the side– it’s almost Biblical paired with how tormented you look, eyebrows pulled together and mouth downturned into a frown even in your sleep.

He holsters his gun and pinches his brow with a heavy sigh.

“Jesus Christ, Bill– that’s an injured, pregnant woman. She’s not a danger to anyone.”

Bill grumbles an unintelligible response.

Another sigh tumbles out of Joel’s mouth, “Did you try to talk to her?”

“No.” Bill crosses his arms and huffs like a child being told off for hitting their sibling.

The wind blows into the room and causes Joel to shiver, fingers weaving together in front of him in an effort to gain some warmth.

“So, you just assumed that she was a danger based on… what?”

“She broke into my house!” He punctuates his stage-whisper by throwing his hands up in the air in exasperation.

“Bill, you are ridiculous.”

All he does is huff, the bristles of his mustache fly up with the breeze his breath makes.

Joel mutters a curse under his breath and stalks his way to the end of the bed.

“Ma’am? Ma’am?”

Your eyes flash open and he watches your pupils dilate as the bright light offends them. He hates to think it or even put it out into the universe, but your eyes are beautiful. They compliment your features in a way that makes his heart stop in his chest. 

Before Joel even has a chance to react, you’re up and as far from him as you can be, huddled against the metal headboard. Your boots leave behind a muddy stain on the white sheets as you clamber away from him.

He can see you wince in pain with the effort. It’s then that he notices the circle of blood you’ve left on the bedding where you were laying. It’s soaked into the white, turning it a dark maroon that slowly fades to pink around the edges. He can tell it’s fresh from the way the stain expands itself.

Jesus Christ.

“Woah, woah now, darlin’. Ain’t nobody here to hurt ya.”

Eyebrows crease together, you raise a hand up to signal him to stop.

Your voice comes out in a husky whisper, upper lip snarled, “Get away from me.”

He takes a step back and puts his hands up in mock surrender. He can tell you’re not going to hurt him, nor would you be capable of it, probably, but he wants to keep you calm and if backing up is gonna keep you calm, he’s willing to do it.

“You’re hurt,” he points out with a finger pointed down to the blood.

You chance a quick glance down to where he points, like you’re afraid that if you don’t look at him for two seconds that he’ll get the jump on you. He supposes he could. 

As if you can read his mind, you look back up at him with a piercing scowl.

“I’m fine,” you reply, voice a little clearer now.

He scoffs with an eye roll to accompany the sarcastic action, “Clearly you’re not, don’t have to act all tough. I’m Jackson’s sheriff; I can get you to the town doctor in less than ten minutes.”

Joel watches you evaluate him. Your eyes dart from one of his to the other, run down his body, and then back up to his face. He’s never felt so vulnerable just from being looked at. You soften a little.

“Really?”

He nods patiently, “Yes, ma’am. Dr. Teddy’d get you fixed up in no time.”

Your chest expands with one breath, two breaths, and then you let out a pitiful sigh.

He takes a chance by putting a hand out for you to take– a sign of good faith– and you hesitate. Your fingers twitch by your side. Suddenly, your soft palm grips his calloused one with a quiet ferocity. 

Joel helps you up and to his truck, not without a little mumble in his direction about how he better get her on trespassing, which he quickly replies to with a directed glare. Bill retreats into the kitchen to sulk.

Your wool coat is soaked with blood around the back, turning the nice tan into a dark brown. He tries his best to ignore it as he guides you up into the passenger seat. He’s going to have to clean the damn leather after he figures out what to do with you.

Hopping into his own seat, he turns the key in the ignition and turns the heat on. Out of the corner of his eye he can see you sink down into the warmth.

You’re silent the whole ride there, which he’s fine with. He’s never been good at small talk and he doesn’t think he wants to know what the hell is going on with you, your trespassing, or your excess of injuries. 

Or maybe he does. He shakes the thought out of his head. He’s going to get you examined at Teddy’s and send you on your way– he doesn’t have time for this shit. Not today. Today is supposed to be a normal day.

He parks in the one parking spot in front of the small, blue house that is the home to the practice of the one and only qualified doctor in town. 

Teddy is kind. You need someone kind, which is definitely not Joel.

He points to the building and motions with his chin to follow him. You stumble out of the car and do just that, putting most of your weight on your left leg as you walk. He offers an arm out to you, but you ignore him and push ahead.

He stomps up the porch steps behind you, kicking snow out of the tread of his boots before he steps inside.

The bell jingles loudly to signal your arrival, but he yells anyway, “Teddy!? You in here?”

A soft, raspy voice calls from the back, “One second!”

He turns to you with a, hopefully, calming smile. It feels more like a grimace than anything else on his stiff face.

“This is Doctor Theodora Taylor’s office. She’s gonna take a look at ya.”

Without warning, Teddy is next to him. Her voice makes him jump, but he tries to hide it behind a scoff. Her red-covered lips turn up into a smirk as she regards you.

“You can call me Teddy.” She holds out a hand to you. You hesitate before you grab her hand in yours for a weak handshake. He watches your muscles tense when you make contact with her, but the spasm goes away just as quickly as it came on.

Theodora Taylor is one of Joel’s only friends– her husband Jan is also included in that small number. She has thick, jet black, curly hair and skin so pale it’s a surprise to know that she goes outside at all. Her features are soft, lips always a vibrant red that makes her bright blue eyes pop. Voice raspy from a youth of defiant smoking, she is a calming force and a bright light.

“Follow me– exam room’s right over here.”

He follows behind you, because he has to. He has questions he’s supposed to ask and technically he needs to know if you need to go to court because of the trespassing, but there’s a part of him (the large majority, if he’s honest with himself) that just wants to send you to wherever you belong and leave you be. Bill can be convinced to drop the charges some way or another.

Teddy gives him no attention after her initial questioning of the situation and neither do you, surprisingly, as he plops down in one of the squeaky, teal, pleather chairs usually reserved for parents or significant others. It’s uncomfortably cold under his blue jeans. He’s sat in this chair a couple times before– one time when Ellie broke her leg a few years ago when she first started living with him, and a few times before and after that to evaluate drunks from the bar after they got into slurred fights resulting in, usually, minor injuries.

He watches Teddy go through the motions of listening to your lungs and taking your blood pressure. Joel isn’t a doctor, never claimed to be, so he doesn’t fully understand what’s going on, but she doesn’t look overly concerned as she peels the coat off your back and pulls your shirt up in the back to examine whatever injury is back there.

But when she puts a little too much pressure on your right leg, your whole body tightens and you gasp.

“Woah, what’s going on? I hurt you?”

You pause, evaluate (which he has quickly identified as a habit of yours), and pull your dress up higher on your thigh to reveal a nasty bruise that he hadn’t seen before. Black mixed with purple and dark hues of red over the entirety of your upper thigh. He has to stop himself from letting out the gasp that’s constricting the back of his throat.

Teddy’s dark eyebrows furrow for a split second before she cools her expression and looks up at you with gentle eyes.

“I’m sorry, hon, but I have to ask– where did those bruises come from?”

He watches your eyes flicker up to him and back down to your lap. Teddy takes the obvious hint, and so does he.

Something is very wrong.

“Joel, could you step out, please?”

He nods and pushes up out of the chair, “Yeah, ‘course.”

A grateful expression flashes over your face that he only catches for a second as he shuts the door behind him.

He knows he should be in there technically, to continue his evaluation, but it feels wrong to listen to you be vulnerable. He’s never really had a problem with it before– the child growing in you is probably the reason he feels the need to hide. Pregnant women make him think of her.

A few minutes pass as he sits in the quiet lobby– no one around to bother him or quiet his rampant thoughts. Just him, the open air with a distinct smell of hand sanitizer, and the muffled sounds of cars driving past.

He can see Teddy talking to you through the glass window on the top half of the door, that’s usually covered by a curtain, but it needs to be open in case you really are a danger to yourself or Teddy and she needs help restraining you. You look ashamed, embarrassed. Teddy just looks back at you while you talk, no emotions flashing over her face– just simply taking the information in. He wonders if it’s to keep you calm.

The front door slams open. The little bell attached to it slaps into the wood aggressively.

Maria almost sprints into the building; she looks disheveled, braids pulled back into a makeshift ponytail with a rubber band, eyes wide in a panic, still wearing her pink, flannel pyjama pants.

When she spots Joel sitting in one of the many chairs strewn in random places around the room, she lets out a puff of air and hunches over with her hands on her knees.

“Hey, we just heard–”

He nods and points to the windowed door, “Yeah, Teddy’s in there talking to her now.”

Tommy follows behind her. He looks just as out-of-breath as his wife from running after her.

“Why the fuck did we run here? Jesus Christ,” Tommy mutters to himself, pulling a hand through his hair while the other holds his tan stetson to his chest.

She clears her throat, ignoring Tommy as he walks in and keeping her attention on Joel, “How injured is she?”

“Not sure. She was walking fine, but her legs, Maria– they were covered in cuts and bruises.”

“Oh god,” she sighs and rubs a hand down her face, “Okay, I’ll go in there and talk to her. You two stay out here.”

They nod their heads to her like the loyal guard dogs they are.

Tommy flops his ass down in the chair next to Joel’s, slaps him on the thigh, and spreads his legs like a cowboy. Joel’s posture is ramrod straight, fingers intertwined in his lap. He can’t stop himself from bouncing his knee– the nervous energy in his brain spreading throughout his body. He is Tommy’s opposite as always. 

They watch the three of you through the small window cut out of the door. He can visibly see you calm down as Maria speaks to you in her usual confident and calming tone.

Tommy crosses his arms with a scowl on his face, “I recognize her.”

“How?”

“I��� I’m not sure.”

Joel examines you for a second. You look upper class based on your outfit alone– expensive wool coat, gold jewelry. But those sad eyes– he could spot those sad eyes anywhere. He feels like a fool for not noticing it earlier.

“Betty’s funeral.”

Tommy points a finger at him, a grin spreading across his stubbled cheeks. “Yes! Yes, that’s it. She gave that speech.”

“She’s Betty’s granddaughter.”

A chill runs down his spine and all the way down to his toes.

Tommy slaps his knee in some show of triumph, “Oh man, that explains why she was at the cottage.”

Joel looks over at you again. He thinks he can see your eyes starting to water, so he shifts his gaze back over to his brother. He can’t bear to see your vulnerability; not like this, not again.

“Yeah… it does.”

Maria steps back out of the room and shuts the door behind her soft and slowly.

“Joel. I need to talk to you really quickly.”

She’s got that look, pinched eyebrows and lips downturned: the guilty look she gets when she asks him to watch their son, Benny.

“What? Is it a secret?”

She turns to Tommy with a glare, “Shut up, Thomas.”

Tommy throws his hands up in the air and widens his eyes in exaggeration.

Maria turns back to Joel, a disgruntled scowl covering her face. She and Tommy love each other– have for more years than he’s even lived here– but Tommy is the King of Maria’s annoyance. He knows just how to push her buttons, the ones that Joel wouldn’t dare to go near.

Joel nods, and follows her out to the porch. It’s cold, too cold to be outside.

“What,” he deadpans. Get it over with, he wants to spit out.

“I need you to take her in.”

No.

“Excuse me,” Joel blurts out, his mouth five steps ahead of his brain in shock.

Maria places her hands on her hips and rolls her deep brown eyes. Even in pyjama pants, she’s intimidating. 

“Joel, I highly doubt she will be any trouble to you. You’re barely home anyway.”

He can’t picture you in his space with your sullen expression and hollow eyes. The idea of anyone besides him or his family in his home makes him want to cringe.

“I’ve already got my hands full with Ellie. I don’t think taking on a huge responsibility like this is really in my job description.”

And, boy, does that ruffle Maria’s feathers. Her face drops even further than before.

“This ‘responsibility’ is a pregnant woman with no family, no home, and no job who needs immediate bedrest. She is extremely fragile right now and it’s best for her and her baby if she can keep her in to term. She just needs a place to relax, read a book, do some light chores– she’s not a teenage girl, she’s a grown woman who can take care of herself.

“And I don’t want to mention this, but I feel that I have to: she’s Betty’s granddaughter. You’re really not gonna give her and Betty’s great-granddaughter the best chance they have of living? After all she did for you?”

She gives him a pointed look; they both know she’s right. Her brutal honesty makes him uncomfortable, makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand to attention.

Joel sighs, “Maria…”

Suddenly, he watches guilt take over her features again. “I know; I’m sorry. I just need you to really think before you say no to that woman in there.”

“I’m not… ‘m not saying no, I just don’t think it’s a good idea.”

She shakes her head and puffs out a breath of frustration, “Why?”

He doesn’t really know why. Call it a gut feeling, call it intuition, call it whatever you want– he doesn’t know why it’s a bad idea. He just does.

“I don’t know.”

Maria’s shoulders sag. “Just do it. Please.”

He feels himself giving in before he can even say the words. He folds like a cheap suit.

Hands held in the air in surrender, he replies, “Fine. Fine, okay.”

“Thank you,” she sighs out exasperatedly.

“Couldn’t I just… couldn’t I go live in my grandma’s house? Then I wouldn’t have to be anybody’s problem.”

Teddy shakes her head, a strand of her curly hair falling into her face, “Betty’s place is way too far from here. You need to be as close as possible to the clinic with how high-risk your pregnancy is. Joel lives two houses down from here and he has an extra bedroom. You wouldn’t be any kind of problem for him anyway.”

He shakes his head, “You wouldn’t be.”

He can tell you’re conflicted. Your eyes flit from his face, to Tommy’s, to Teddy’s, Maria’s, and then back to his. There’s a hint of something there in your irises– something that makes his skin crawl with the memory of when his own eyes looked as dull as yours. Grief. For what exactly, he doesn’t know, but it’s there.

“Okay,” you mumble, eyes going to your lap where your fingers are picking at your cuticles.

What has he gotten himself into?

“Okay,” Maria exclaims, “Good. Let’s let Teddy finish her exam– Joel, you stay with her until she’s done?”

He nods.

“Alright, let’s go, deputy.”

She waves a hand for Tommy to follow her.

His brother turns to you with an overly-confident smile and chuckles, “She’s embarrassed that if she admits she likes me that people might find out she has emotions. We’re married, y’know? You’d think people would’ve found out she’s not a robot by now.”

A small smile takes over your lips, barely reaching your eyes. There’s Tommy doing what he’s always been naturally good at– talking to people, making them feel comfortable and relaxed.

“Tommy,” Maria shouts from the entryway.

“Coming, wife!”

Joel doesn’t even have to see her to know that she’s rolling her eyes into the back of her head. She loves him to death, and so does he, but he’s always been a bit of a handful.

Teddy shakes her head amusedly as she listens to the tell-tale sound of the front door closing behind them.

She turns back to the room, with you in tow.

It’s another 20 minutes before Teddy comes back, but she’s alone. You’ve been left in the exam room by yourself.

Teddy flops into the chair next to him and lets out a heaving breath.

“She’s got a pretty large cut on her back that’s going to need the bandage changed at least once every day. So, I’ll be there every day around noon to change it until it’s healed, but if she starts to bleed through it, I’m gonna need you to help her do it. I assume you can do that?”

“Yeah.”

“She can walk on her own, but she just needs to keep that leg elevated and iced as much as possible– give it a couple weeks to heal up. Just keep an eye on her for me.”

“Okay.”

There’s an awkward pause. She won’t look at him, just stares off towards the large bay window that overlooks the snow-covered trees in front of them.

“Did she tell you what happened?”

She nods. Her face is emotionless. “Yes.”

“Do I get to know?”

Teddy purses her lips and shakes her head, “Not unless she tells you.”

Licking his lips, he nods back, “Okay.”

He tastes blood when he bites down on his bottom lip to rip a piece of dead, dry skin off. His tongue runs over the wound left behind– smooth, raw. He relishes the taste of the aftermath of his pain.

She looks over at him. “And, Joel?”

“Yeah?”

Her cool expression is replaced by concern– heavy, devastated concern. 

She lets out a long breath and mutters back to him, “Please be patient with her.”

“Yup.”

Joel cannot handle this conversation anymore. He needs to get out of here before he explodes. In what? Anger? Remorse? Pity? He doesn’t care; getting out of here is what he needs and he needs it now.

Pushing himself up makes his knees crack with the effort. The oncoming winter always makes him feel his age more than anything. He masks his pain as he always does with a practiced cough and a slap to the side of his thigh.

“Whelp, gonna get outta your hair, Teddy. Tell Di I said ‘hey’.”

She looks equally relieved to be ending this conversation with him, even more so with the mention of her toddler.

“I will. She misses you; you should come visit soon.”

“I’ll try.”

He probably won’t.

WIth a quick side hug and a goodbye from Teddy, he walks out of the waiting area and to where you’re sitting in the exam room.

“Let’s go,” he states, pointing a finger towards the front door.

He doesn’t wait around for you to follow. You catch up.

Once you get to the porch, you begin talking to him quietly, “You know, you really don’t have to do this.”

You’re shivering aggressively, whether it’s the cold or the effort it takes you to talk to him, he doesn’t know. He’s just realized that you left your bloody coat behind in the exam room.

He shucks off his duck jacket and holds it out to you. You stare down at his hand like it’s going to bite you and shake your head reluctantly.

“Well, Mayor says I gotta, so seems like I don’t really have much of a choice, do I,” he replies with a huff, walking down to the bottom of the porch steps before your voice stops him.

“You could’ve said ‘no’.”

Your face is stoic, but he can see the apology in your eyes. They’re very expressive, like you can’t help that you wear your heart in them. He wonders if you even know.

He shakes his head, “She's my sister-in-law, I could not have said no.”

No response comes from you as you pick up your aching feet and creep your way down the steps. Joel offers to help, but you sigh and send a glare in his direction. He backs off.

When you’re at his side finally, he points at his house– two houses down and across the street. It’s a small thing– but it works for him and Ellie, who spends most of her time in the garage anyways. He’s always wanted to paint the light grey-blue siding something more neutral, but he just never has the time nor the energy and there’s no way in hell he’ll hire someone else to do it. Someday.

You fall into step beside him, heels of your boots clacking on the cracking concrete of the sidewalk.

The sweater dress you’re wearing looks comfortable, but the tights don’t look very warm and the large stain on the back of it must be freezing. His house is right there; he’ll let you borrow something of his while he goes to grab your bags from Betty’s.

You speak up again, arms crossed and hands shoved into your armpits.

“Tommy's your brother?”

“Yup.”

“Apple fell very far from the tree.”

He huffs, “Not really a talker.”

“No shit.”

You’re being brave. He can tell you’re nervous, but you’re trying your best to hold a conversation and that’s pretty fucking brave to him.

“Thank you,” you mutter through an exhale. Your breath is visible in the early morning air.

“Don’t gotta thank me. Just doin’ my job.”

“Thank you for doing your job, then.”

He doesn’t like being thanked. It makes him uncomfortable, rattles his bones. But he’s not going to ignore you when you’re being vulnerable– that would make him even more uncomfortable.

“No problem.”

A high-pitched voice screams across the road, “Joel!”

You both watch as Ellie runs down the street, her arms waving above her head like a lunatic, sneakers screeching because of the drag of her feet. The child has no decorum or manners. 

He drops his forehead into his hand.

When she gets to the two of you, she leans over with both hands on her bent knees, breathing heavily. She takes a moment to recover. Joel spares a glance in your direction, but you’re no longer beside him. He catches a sliver of your hair as it whips behind him.

Ellie’s gonna be the death of him, probably you too if you scare this easily.

“Can I go over to Dina’s?”

His hands settle on his hips in his most “I’m not fucking around” pose, “No, kid. I gotta talk to you about somethin’. Go home.”

“What? Dude!”

“Don’t ‘dude’ me. Go,” he points to the house and leaves it at that.

She turns and stomps her way to the house with her arms crossed and a sour look on her face, “Ugh! Whatever, asshole.”

He loves her and he would travel to the ends of the earth for her; but it’s moments like these where sometimes he wished he was a little harder on her. Maybe she wouldn’t scream swear words in the middle of the street. He doubts it.

“Who was that?”

Joel clears his throat, “Uh, that's my kid.”

Your eyebrows furrow, expressing the most you have the entire morning, “You have a kid?”

It’s accusatory– the emphasis on the ‘you’. He can feel himself bristle with something at the accusation that he wouldn’t be capable of caring for a child. What is it about him that makes you think he wouldn’t have a kid?

You’re right. She’s not his. But he had a child. A long time ago.

He huffs through a dry chuckle, “Well, she’s not technically mine— but she lives with me and I feed her, so she’s my problem.”

“Whose is she?” Your eyes flick across the street to Ellie and then back to him.

He can’t help the sigh that leaves his lips.

“A friend’s. She passed away a few years ago and she didn’t have any family, so…”

Your face shifts with pity, forehead wrinkled and eyes wide, “Oh, I'm so sorry.”

He’s used to the pity– the stares, the muttered sorrys. He doesn’t want it from anyone, but he especially doesn’t want it from complete strangers like you.

“It’s alright. She was my daughter’s friend more than mine, but when she got sick, I agreed to take care of her kid.”

“Oh, you have a daughter?”

He feels the grief rip through his chest like he always does when someone mentions her. But you don’t know what happened like everyone else in this town does, so he’s not going to get irritable with you like he would with other people. Besides, you don’t need Joel to be an asshole to you when you’re supposed to be on bed rest.

He hesitates, “Yeah.”

Your eyes search his face– for what, he doesn’t know. But whatever you’re looking for, he thinks you’ve found it as you move the conversation on from her and onto Ellie’s frame as she slams the front door shut so loudly that the entire street can probably hear it. He thanks his face for conveying how desperately he does not want to talk with you about Sarah.

“What’s her name?” You point in the direction that the teenager went.

“Ellie.” 

He shifts his stance, ready to restart your short walk to his house when you speak up.

“She seems like a good kid.”

He lets out a breath of amusement, “She's the best. Has a very colorful vocabulary though.”

You shrug, “Eh, she’s a teenager. I was a lot worse than her at that age.”

“Oh, really?” He’s not sure if this is surprising information or not. He’s having a hard time getting a read on you– and that’s a big part of his job, to read people. It feels wrong that he can’t figure you out.

“Yeah. I could’ve won some kind of award– ‘Worst Daughter In The World’. I would’ve deserved it too,” you huff.

He hums in acknowledgement. He doesn’t want you to feel like he’s ignoring you; he just doesn’t know what the hell to say to that. That you did deserve it? He wouldn’t know.

“It’s why my parents used to ship me off to my grandmother’s. ‘Grandma knows how to handle you’, they’d say. Really, I just liked her a lot more than them.”

He gets that. He really gets that.

“Well, I ain’t got nowhere to ship Ellie to. She’s stuck with me whether she likes it or not.”

You hum, “I think she likes it.”

He chuckles, “And you can tell that from a thirty-second argument?”

You look up at him with a burgeoning smile on your face, “She wouldn’t have listened to you if she didn’t like you– trust me.”

Trust me.

“Whatever you say, ma’am.”

You nod resolutely.

It’s silent the thirty seconds it takes to walk the rest of the way to Joel’s. 

He shows you around the house and watches you as you map out his home in your head. You pay extra attention to the exits and the windows. Joel catches the way you stare longingly at the kitchen from the entryway.

When he walks up the stairs to show you the bedrooms, you lag behind. But he doesn’t notice until he’s already at the top of the stairs and he doesn’t hear your footsteps anymore. You’re staring at a picture on the wall. It’s of Sarah. 

You don’t say anything. Just stare. He can’t get himself to say anything either.

One breath, two breaths. And you look up at him with something in your eyes that he can’t quite identify; it’s soft, but not pity. Understanding, maybe.

You walk up the rest of the stairs, holding tight to the banister. There’s a slight twitch in your lip when you put weight on your bad leg. He offers to help you, but you just shake your head.

He points out the upstairs bathroom, his room, and then guides you to the guest bedroom that’s been gathering dust for a while now. It used to be Ellie’s, but ever since she’d moved into the garage, it’s been empty. He’d renovated it on the very off chance that one of his relatives came to visit, but it’s stood empty for almost two years, so he doesn’t find himself opening the door very often.

“This’ll be your room. It’s not much, but it’s enough to get you through until you get that baby out of you.”

It’s a small room, enough to comfortably hold a double-bed, a couple side tables, and a dresser. The closet door stands ajar in the corner, full of Christmas decorations. He’s going to have to take those out– find somewhere else for them. Maybe Tommy has room in his basement–

“Okay,” you mumble, “Thank you.”

Your heels click on the hardwood floor in even beats as you walk into the room. Your evaluating eye examines the bed when you approach it. You swipe at a spot on the blanket and the dust jumps and sails through the air, illuminated by the sunlight. Once you’ve decided it’s good enough, you sit down slowly, a hand planted on the mattress behind you as you lower yourself.

Maria had said you were six months pregnant. He remembers how miserable Sarah’s mom had been at this time in her pregnancy. The memory makes him want to puke.

“I know it’s none of my business—“

You glower at him, “Yup. I would say that too.”

“But, whatever brought you here— I hope we can help you. You just let me know if you need anything.”

You soften a little, but the glare remains. “Okay.”

“You ain’t a talker either?”

The both of you know he isn’t talking about “talking”. Emotional vulnerability isn’t a strong suit of his, and it is very clearly not one of yours either.

“Nope.”

He nods, turns, and walks out the door.

Ellie is strong. You don’t lose your mom at thirteen and not have massive amounts of strength afterwards. But she is an expert pouter.

When Joel creeks open the garage door, Ellie is face down on her bed, limbs spread out beneath her. A punk song plays over her speaker that makes Joel’s ear drums pop. Even with the hearing loss in his right ear, he can feel his teeth rattling.

He walks over to the blasting stereo and turns it off.

Her head whips up to pierce him with a death glare, “What the fuck?!”

“Can’t hear myself think with that shit on.”

She mumbles something in her pillow, probably some egregious swear word or some insult related to his age, but he lets her get away with it. Your words come back to him– she wouldn’t listen to him if she really didn’t like him. He’s not patient with most people, but he tries to be for her.

He lowers himself on her bed with a grunt.

“She’s gonna be living with us until her baby comes.”

She hums into her pillow and stuffs her face even further into it.

Joel sighs, “What are you thinking, kid? I’m sorry you didn’t get much of a choice.”

Her voice is muffled as she responds, “Well, what does it matter what I think? You would’ve done it anyway.”

His eyebrows furrow, “What makes you think that?”

“Dina heard she was Betty’s grandkid. Is that true?”

He has no doubt that Dina already knows; she loves to harass Maria when she thinks something is going on and he’s sure that Ellie has been texting Dina since she was forced to go home. 

He nods reluctantly. Joel is sure that as soon as he leaves the room, the stereo will be back on and her phone will be in her hands.

“Exactly. You would not have said ‘no’ to her.”

He sputters, “I’m very capable of sayin’ ‘no’.”

She shakes her head and flips over onto her back, “Not when Betty’s involved.”

He huffs, a small smile on his lips, “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

He doesn’t hear the knock on the front door, but Ellie does.

“There’s someone at the door, old man.”

Joel sends a glare in her direction and hoists himself up and off her bed.

He walks to her door, but she interrupts him, “Hey, Joel?”

“Yeah, kid,” he huffs.

Her joking smirk has fallen off her face and a rare seriousness replaces it.

“I’m okay with it, by the way… with her staying. Don’t worry about it.”

All he does is nod. She mocks him with an equally gruff nod.

“We’re not done talkin’ about this; there’s gonna be some new rules around here,” he states.

Ellie throws her limbs up into the air and waves them around erratically, “Whatever! Get out of here so I can sulk!”

The door closes softly behind him and his quiet chuckle.

Opening the front door reveals Mrs. Cassini, his neighbor and the town gossip. 

Her grey hair is in tight, pink curlers and she has a half-done knitting project in her hands, like she’d gotten up in a hurry. There’s little footsteps in the snow in a path from her porch, through his yard, and up to his own porch; her purple slippers are so soaked that they look like a completely different color.

She leaves no time for pleasantries.

“I hear you’ve got a pregnant, homeless woman living in your house.”

It’s gotten to a point where he doesn’t even question how she hears things anymore. He heard a rumor a long time ago from one of their other neighbors that somehow her landline picked up other people’s phone calls. He stopped using his landline after that.

He can’t help the breath of frustration that puffs out of his mouth, “Mrs. Cassini, go home, please. She doesn’t need you spreadin’ rumors about her. She’s already stressed enough as it is.”

Her eyes widen. 

She gasps, “So, it’s true?”

Well, it was going to be confirmed at some point. Guess that point is right now.

“Mrs. Cassini, please go home.”

She huffs like a child, turns on her heel, and walks back to her little cottage next door. He needs to get some sort of security system in his house, specifically for this woman and her unexpected visits.

He hears footsteps scurry up the stairs when he turns around to go back into the house. 

Well, shit.

Joel hadn’t heard the bedroom door open nor had he heard your footsteps as you came out. Mrs. Cassini always knew the worst times to show up, didn’t she?

He approaches the bottom of the stairwell and calls out to you as calmly as he can, “I assume you heard that?”

A tiny gasp comes from the top of the stairs and your feet come into view. You step down a couple stairs and sit yourself down carefully on the plush carpet.

You nod.

“I’m sorry. She’s just kinda like that. Town gossip and all.”

You shrug, stiff and dejected.

“I get it. Weird pregnant girl shows up and everyone’s gotta know what’s wrong with her.”

“Well, it’s none of their business. I’ll just keep turnin’ ‘em away.”

You grab your knees like a kid who’s in timeout. Why do you always look like you’re about to be reprimanded– like you have to protect yourself from some unseen force? He suspects he might look that way too sometimes.

“Thank you. For telling her to go away.”

He hums, hands awkwardly stuffed in his pockets.

“Well, uh, I gotta go back to work, but don’t worry about Bill– I’ll get him to drop the charges on you.”

“Oh, okay.” You nod with a faraway look in your eye, hands coming up to your stomach almost instinctively.And he leaves, hops into his ancient, blue pickup truck, and puts it into drive. What happened to his normal fucking day?

series masterlist | joel masterlist | masterlist of all masterlists

[moesnotifs]

mine | 4. you saw me start to believe

pairing: young!no-outbreak!joel miller x f!reader

chapter summary: a moment of panic brings about some clarity for both you and joel

or, joel’s 23rd birthday, your first anniversary, and a moment between joel and his momma

Warnings: panic attack and imposter syndrome (reader); brief mentions of depression and parental neglect/abuse (reader and joel); A CALLBACK!!!! (if you can identify the callback, ten points to you); this writer is very aware that orange juice doesn’t actually help cure a cold, but she always grew up drinking it while she was sick, so it’s included in the story bc this writer isn’t going to be stopped by logic

word count: 5.5k

a/n: sorry it took me so long for this to get done :( i have early onset arthritis and with the weather changing, my wrists and knuckles have been bothering the fuck out of me, which makes me not wanna write (mostly cause it hurts), but i’ve been sitting on this for a while and i thought that i should just get it done so y’all can motivate me to write more haha. enjoy <3

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read on ao3

Do you remember all the city lights on the water?

You saw me start to believe for the first time

✦ ✦ ✦

September 26, 1995

“Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear…”

A chorus of different names come out.

Essie exclaims, “Papi!”

Sarah screeches, “Daddy!”

And you simply say, “Joel,” as you sit his cake in front of him– chocolate cake with vanilla frosting, with a giant “Happy 23rd Birthday!” written out in your sloppy cake writing and three green candles above it. His eyes glow in the dark room, candle light reflected in them.

“Happy birthday to you!”

All three of you cheer as Joel blows out his candles, Sarah clapping excitedly at the prospect of cake being put in front of her soon.

“Happy birthday, baby,” you mutter in Joel’s ear and kiss the side of his head.

He hums and puts his hand out for the cake knife that you’d set down on the kitchen counter behind you. You reach and grab it, setting it in his palm.

“Thank you, sugar.” The love in his eyes is so obvious as his head turns to look up at you. You know he’s not just thanking you for the cake knife– but you can talk about it later.

“Mhm,” you kiss the top of his head, fresh from his shower this morning after a very eventful night without Sarah in the house. His curls smell like leather and brandy.

“Daddy, please, can we have cake now?”

Joel cuts into the cake because he knows his daughter’s impatience will always win, “Yes, baby.”

After Essie went home and Sarah had a bath to get the frosting she had smeared all over her cheeks off and put to bed, you and Joel are alone in his living room.

“I got you a present,” you tease with a smirk on your face.

You’ve been waiting a month to give him his gift. You had taken Sarah to the mall one afternoon to give Joel a break for a little bit (and also because you wanted to take her to Claire’s to get her even more hair accessories, but Joel didn’t need to know that at the time). You hadn’t really been looking for a gift for him, but you saw it in the display and you knew you had to get it for him.

“Oh, really?”

“Mhm.”

You rummage through his coat closet that you stashed his present in last week, knowing he doesn’t ever open it. You pull out a delicately wrapped box in dark green wrapping paper and a big purple bow on top.

“What did my beautiful girl get me?”

“Open and you’ll see, Miller.”

“Okay, okay,” he chuckles.

He takes the bow off the top and sticks it on the top of your head. You scrunch your nose at him, though he doesn’t look over– invested in opening your present.

When he gets the wrapping off of the box, he takes his pocket knife out and cuts through the haphazardly-placed packing tape you had used to close the box.

You watch as he flips his knife closed, careful to do it as far from you as possible, and sticks it back in his jeans. He steals a glance in your direction, eyebrows raised.

You smile and nod, “Open it.”

He nods in response and flips the flaps of the box open. His eyes go wide.

“Oh my god, sugar!”

Inside is a tan Carhartt duck coat, the same one he has been ogling at for months. 

“Look inside the right pocket.”

You don’t have to see it to know what’s embroidered in the slick material. You’d stared at it for hours debating if it was too cheesy or if Joel would find it weird, but ultimately you had decided to do it. Now, you’re second guessing everything as you watch him shift the coat around in his lap to look where you had instructed him to.

His smile melts into a dopey grin when he gently opens the pocket.

“Oh, baby.”

In messy purple embroidery thread are the words, “the moment i knew”.

“What the fuck,” he lets out a huff of amusement, eyes soft and shiny.

You grab his hand and intertwine it with yours on your lap. “That day we met, y’know I didn’t know it at the time, but the moment I put my phone number in your pocket I knew this was gonna change me forever– you were gonna change me forever. I just thought I should memorialize it somehow, remind you how much I love you.”

“What the fuck?” He tugs on your hand and grabs your thigh, hoisting you into his lap. You can’t help the shriek that slips out of your mouth.

You’re straddling his hips, pressed close as he hooks his large hands around the bend of your knee and pulls you even tighter to his chest. His minty breath fans over your face.

“I love you,” he mutters, “You’re so thoughtful, baby. Thank you.”

You hum and give him a small peck on the lips, teeth clashing into his lightly because of the smiles on both of your faces.

He shakes his head. “No, seriously. Thank you for this whole day. You didn’ have to do all this.”

You gasp in mock exasperation, “Yes, I did! A boy only turns twenty-three once.”

He chuckles, giving your thighs a light squeeze, “I s'pose that’s true.”

“It is.” You emphasize your point with a light pat on his cheek.

His eyes search your face in a moment of quiet adoration. The smile on his lips makes his big, brown eyes squint around his crow’s feet.

It’s almost like you can’t help it, like the words spill out of your mouth before you can even think of them. “I love you.”

He presses his forehead against yours, “I love you too, sugar.”

✦ ✦ ✦

October 1995

Joel isn’t answering his phone. He was supposed to be here an hour ago to pick you up, but he isn’t answering his cell phone or his home phone. You’d left messages on his answering machine, but nothing. At this point, you’ve lost your reservations at the nice Italian restaurant that Joel had said he’d take you to and you were starting to get very worried.

What if Sarah was hurt? What if Joel was hurt? What if something happened to both of them?

Elaine was on a date with Robin and you had been ready for almost three hours now and you were anxious. It didn’t help that the brown, floral dress you had decided to wear tonight was a little tighter around your lungs than you had anticipated.

You needed to get out of this stupid claustrophobic dorm room.

So, in a dazed and anxious state, you scooped your heels off the ground, slipped them on your feet, and walked all the way to Joel’s apartment.

Your feet hurt and it’s sprinkling rain down onto your perfectly styled hair, but you don’t care. Something is wrong.

When you approach Joel’s door, you can hear screaming on the other side.

Fuck. You were about to walk into a murder.

You desperately shift around your purse for your key and jam it into the lock, letting yourself inside.

What you walk into is not a murder, but Joel holding and attempting to rock a screaming Sarah as she pounds her little fists into his shoulder. There are tears and snot streaming down her cheeks and nose, soaking into her pink and purple pajama dress.

You decide to pipe up. Despite the fact that this looks like a very vulnerable moment between the two, something is very wrong and you want to see if you can help, “Joel?”

His head whips to your voice and his eyebrows furrow for a second, before a look of recognition flashes across his face.

You can barely hear him over Sarah’s wails. “Oh no. Oh no! Our anniversary dinner! Baby, I am so, so sorry. I should’ve called you. I just haven’t been able to get Sarah to calm down and I guess I didn’ hear my phone ring and I am so sorry.”

You scrunch your nose at him, shaking your head, drops of water falling from your hair and onto your shoulders, “Don’t apologize. What’s going on?”

He closes his eyes and buries his head into Sarah’s shoulder with a heavy sigh, “She’s got the flu. Had to leave work to pick her up from school ‘cause she threw up. Took her to the doctor and he says she’s just got the flu and that it’ll go away in a few days, but she’s been hysterical ever since we got home.”

You close the door behind you and walk over to them determinedly, heels clicking on the hardwood flooring.

Running a hand down Sarah’s back reveals to you that she’s sweating so profusely that it’s soaking through and into the cotton material of her dress. Her muscles relax as your fingers glide down them and you begin to talk quietly in her ear as her sobs start to quiet slightly, “Hey Guppy, you sick?”

She nods, little lips molded into a deep pout.

“It hurts,” she hiccups and lets out another sob to emphasize her pain.

You rub at her shoulders, Joel still bouncing her slightly, “What hurts, baby?”

“My head,” she wails, pointing between her eyes with a shaking finger.

“Sinus headache,” you mutter to Joel, “You got decongestant medicine or a humidifier?”

He shakes his head shamefully. You can feel his guilt pouring out of his veins. He doesn’t have the materials to make her better, so he feels like a bad dad, which you know is utter bullshit.

“Keys?”

“For what, sugar?”

You give him a pointed look, “Gonna go get some stuff. I’ll be back. Just gotta borrow the truck.”

He starts to say your name, but you cut him off, “Keys.”

He gives in, because he’ll always give in for his girls. “My dresser.”

You nod at him and grab his keys, a fluffy pink keychain marking them as his. Sarah’s gift to him for his birthday last month that you had helped her pick out.

When you come back out, you kiss both of them on the sides of their heads and lay your temple on Joel’s. You watch his eyes flutter shut at the comfort of your closeness.

“While I’m gone, grab a washcloth from the bathroom and soak it in warm water, ring it out and then put it over her eyes and her nose. It should help with her discomfort and hopefully clear her sinuses up a little bit. If it starts to get cold, warm it up again.”

He nuzzles his temple against yours, “I’m sorry about our date. I could get Momma to come ov–”

“Don’t you dare finish that sentence. I don’t care how we spend our anniversary as long as I get to be with you. It’s an added bonus that we’ve got Guppy to keep us company.”

You kiss her chubby cheek and she lets out a short breath through her tears.

Backing away from his touch, you bring a hand up to caress his cheek, “I’ll be back soon. Don’t forget about the washcloth.”

He nods, eyes still closed.

“I love you.”

You run your thumb over his rough and stubbled cheekbone, “I love you too.”

Driving the truck in heels is a nightmare, but you make it back to the dorm with no incidents, change into something more comfortable, and grab your humidifier from your closet– a college essential for your dry-as-fuck dorm room.

You run to the nearest store and grab some medicine you’re sure will help, some orange juice, a big can of chicken noodle soup, and a movie.

By the time you get back, Sarah is no longer screaming or crying. Joel is sitting on the couch with Sarah in his lap, the back of her head on his chest with a washcloth laying over her eyes and her nose, just like you had instructed him.

You can tell she’s awake because she’s humming along to the radio that echoes through the kitchen and into the living room, her little bare feet moving back and forth with the music.

When Joel hears you come in, he gently picks Sarah off his lap and lays her down on the couch. She doesn’t even utter a word as he does so, too tired from her screaming to put an effort into clinging to her dad.

“Hey, how’s it going?”

He takes the bags from your hands, sighs, and starts the small trek to the kitchen, “Got her to calm down and take some pain relief medicine. Washcloth really helped– thank you, sugar.”

“Something my grandma used to do. She eat dinner?”

He shakes his head, guilt taking over his features again. He shoves the paper bags onto the counter and drops his chin to his chest.

“Hey–” you grab his cheeks and guide his eyes back up to yours– “It’s not your fault. It’s not easy doing this stuff all on your own– that’s why I’m here.”

His beautiful eyes shine in the dim lighting of the dark yellow bulbs above you. He’s always been very emotionally vulnerable with you, but you can tell that in this moment, he’s holding himself back. You lean forward to give him a light peck on his chapped lips.

You bump your forehead into his and look at him cross-eyed because of how close you are. “What’s going on in that head of yours?”

He sighs, “’S hard not to blame myself.”

You nuzzle your forehead against his, “I know, baby. But, it’s not your fault she’s sick. Flu’s been going around the grade school, got a couple teacher-friends there that are sick too. It’s just hitting her hard. Not your fault.”

His broad shoulders sink down as he explains his guilt even further, “She never gets sick, ever. ‘S why I don’t have any medicine or anythin’.”

“Don’t worry about it, I got some stuff. Got some chicken noodle soup– comfort food. Got us a movie to watch too. Should hopefully distract her a little bit.”

He nods, making your head bob up and down with his.

“You’re amazing, did you know that?”

You push him away from you and roll your eyes playfully, “Whatever.”

He’s got that look on his face again– the guilt– but it’s gone before you can blink.

“I heat up the soup, you talk to her?”

You nod.

Walking back into the living room brings you the hilarious sight of Sarah with her legs up in the air, laying back on the couch, with the washcloth covering her face. You can see the outline of her tiny nose poking the cloth into a peak.

“Sarah?”

“Yeah,” she mumbles, voice slightly muffled by the washcloth over her nose.

“Guess what movie I got?

She mumbles something akin to “what?” and slowly crosses her arms.

“Casper.”

You giggle as you watch Sarah sling the washcloth off her face and throw it across the room, a tired smile taking up her tiny lips.

“Really?”

Nodding, you walk over to her and place the back of your hand on her forehead. Definitely still ridiculously hot. “Yeah, baby, but you gotta take some medicine and eat before we start the movie, okay?”

She nods back to you and holds her arms out for you to pick her up, which you do with no hesitation. She leaves a light kiss on your shoulder and lays her head in the same spot, like she was preparing your shoulder for landing.

You get some medicine in her, though she gags a little as the cherry syrup hits her tongue, despite your guidance to plug her nose. While you do this, Joel heats up the soup on the stove and divides it into three bowls– two white ceramic bowls and one smaller, plastic bowl with Strawberry Shortcake on the bottom.

She eats slowly, picking out the pieces of celery and spooning them into Joel’s bowl. He doesn’t say anything as she does this. All he does is pick up his spoon and eat all the pieces she gives to him. You eat in a comforting silence.

When you’re all done eating, you snuggle up on the couch, Sarah in between the two of you. Her left hand is dedicated to squeezing yours every few minutes and her right hand holds Joel’s with a fierce grip. Holding her hand is hot and sweaty, but you do it anyway.

It’s nearing the end of the movie and Joel is fast asleep, head lolling on the back of the couch, mouth wide open. You almost laugh, but you’re scared you’re going to wake him up. He’s always so exhausted. You’ll wait until after you get Sarah to bed.

She moves around a little before she speaks up, eyes half-lidded and looking up at you. Her clammy hand lays on top of yours.

“Momma, I’m tired.”

You freeze. Oh.

You have to shake this off. You cannot let her see what that word just did to you.

“Yeah, baby. Let’s go to bed.”

Standing up, you pick her tiny body up. Joel snores away on the couch, oblivious to the world around him. Joel, wake up.

She tucks her face into your neck and lets out a pitiful little sigh. Her fingers cling to your shirt.

You put her to bed in a haze. She’s asleep before you ever enter her room, but you stay to make sure she settles as you lay her down in her pink sheets. You grab your humidifier from the kitchen and turn it on in her room. You use the color button to make it light up pink.

You come back to the living room and Joel is still fast asleep. Joel, wake up.

You attempt to shake him awake.

“Joel, you gotta get up– I can’t carry you to bed,” you sigh exasperatedly.

He grumbles something you can’t understand, sighs, and snuggles further into the couch cushion behind him.

“God damn it,” you mutter, pushing the heels of your palms into your eyes. It hurts, but it’s better than crying and you are not about to cry– especially not about what Sarah said. This is supposed to be a good thing. You just have to keep telling yourself that: this is a good thing.

“Joel–” you rustle his shoulder again– “You gotta get up, baby. You’re gonna hurt your back if you sleep out here.”

His chest rumbles with some gibberish about how he's “not ready yet,” and he bats an arm out at you to push you away.

You can feel the tears gathering in your eyes. No, no, no, this was not how tonight was supposed to go. You were supposed to just watch Casper and eat soup and go to sleep. You were not supposed to end the night with a panic attack.

“Fuck,” you whisper, sinking down to the floor next to his legs– back leaning on the couch. Your throat feels raw with the effort of keeping your emotions down.

A tear slips out and onto your cheek. No!

This is a good thing. This is a good thing. This is a good thing.

She’s going to hate you. You’re going to fuck this up and she’s going to hate you forever.

A sob wracks your body and up your throat. The bubble of emotions stuck there pops and the horrible sound tumbles out of your mouth.

You wrap your arms around your legs and pull them to your chest.

How could you do this to her? Make her think you were a good caretaker. Trick her into liking you enough to call you ‘mom’.

How could you do this to Joel? Manipulate him into letting you into their lives and fucking everything up for them.

You’re a horrible person.

You’re a horrible person.

You think you feel Joel stirring beside you, but you can’t face him, not after all you’ve done to him– will do to him.

Tears are soaking into your jeans and cooling your skin below them.

There’s more shuffling before Joel speaks up.

“Woah, woah, what’s wrong?”

You choke on your words, another sob falling from your lips, “I’m– I’m gonna fuck it up, Joel.”

“Fuck what up?” 

His fingers comb through your hair, like he knows you like, but you pull away.

“Everything. Sarah.”

“Woah–” you feel him slip down off the couch and onto the floor with you, shoulder to shoulder– “Where the hell did this come from?”

“She called me ‘momma’ while you were asleep… and I liked it.”

This is a good thing.

“Oh, baby. That’s amazing!”

This is a good thing.

“I know! I know!”

“Then, why are you crying, sugar?”

“I don’t deserve it. I’m not good enough.”

His hand hovers over your knee before it falls back onto his thigh. He understands that you don’t want to be touched right now.

“Now, where in the hell did you get an idea like that?”

You hesitate. This is going to be it. As soon as you say this, Joel isn’t going to want anything to do with you. You debate even saying it at all.

This is a good thing.

You have to.

“I– I spent my whole childhood being a burden– being an afterthought. I took care of myself. And ever since I met you, I haven’t felt like that. You like me. Sarah likes me. But–”

No. Don’t do it. Don’t say it.

“I’m a bad person, Joel. I’m selfish and standoffish and I talk too much and I have a bad habit of thinking the worst and some days I can’t get out of bed or feed myself or take a shower and I’m a horrible person and I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve Sarah thinking that highly of me ‘cause I’m not fit for this. I’m going to fuck her up and she’s going to spend the rest of her life like me because of me. I– I don’t want to do what my dad did to me to her.”

Joel is silent. You can’t see what he’s thinking because your head is still stuck between your bent thighs, but you can feel him breathing next to you where you’re connected at the shoulder.

Say something.

He shifts next to you, knee bumping into your calf. He sighs.

“I always look for the worst in people,” he starts, mumbling, “I’m too stubborn– I never let anyone help me with anythin’, if I can help it. Some days, I can’t get out of bed either and I forget to feed myself all the time– there are days that I’m living off coffee alone and I don’t even realize it. I spend every day fightin’ the way my dad raised me, so that I can be gentle and kind to my baby girl. There are rare days where I don’t win. Do you think I’m a horrible person for all that?”

Your head whips up to look at him and you splutter, “No! No, god no.”

It’s the first time you’re looking at him since you started panicking. He’s sitting criss-cross-applesauce with his hands fidgeting in his lap. He’s looking forward, eyes blurry with the same tears that are streaking down his cheeks.

“I remember the first time I held Sarah in my arms. She looked so small, so fragile. I thought: there’s no way that I’m not going to ruin her. I’ve always been a bit too rough around the edges. It’s taken me a long time to realize that being scared is a good thing– means you care about them, means you want them to be safe. You just gotta realize that it’s okay to fuck up sometimes. They’ll forgive you and you’ll learn from it.”

He clears his throat, taking a moment to think before he speaks again.

“You are the least selfish person I’ve ever known. In fact, you’re kind to a fault. You’re a human with feelings and sometimes they get in the way of functioning like other people want you to and that isn’t your fault.”

He turns to look at you and wipes his cheek with the back of his palm.

You’ve seen Joel cry before, but this time feels different– like something in the tiny universe you’ve made for yourselves is shifting.

“You’ve been through so much. The fact that you can function at all is a testament to how amazing you are. That’s my girlfriend you’re insultin’. I don’t let people talk shit ‘bout her ‘cause she’s one of the best things that’s ever happened to me.”

A laughing sob slips from your mouth and your tears start to fall even faster. You can barely see him through the blurry mess covering your vision.

“Sugar, Sarah adores you. She talks about you all the time when you aren’t here, beggin’ me to make you come back home, and when you are here, she wants to spend every minute with you. Sarah would not be givin’ you a second glance if she didn’t like you or didn’t want you to be in her life. And, I’ll admit, I like havin’ you around a whole lot.”

As your heartbeat slows, you can’t help the small smile that takes over your lips.

“I like me being around too.”

He nods once, wiping his cheek again, “Good. If I could help it, you’d be here everyday.”

You shake your head at him in amusement.

“I don’t think I’d mind that.”

“Well, I should hope so– you are the mother of my child.” An invitation.

You lay your head back onto your knees, still looking at him, smile never fading.

“Yea, I guess I am.” You accept.

He lets out a sigh of relief and offers you his hand.

“You wanna talk about it more, or do you just wanna go to bed, baby?”

You take his hand, intertwining your fingers. It feels so right– it always has. From that very first time your hand brushed his on that fateful day that you met, it has always felt like it was meant to be. It has always scared you– if you’re honest, it still does– but, you’re looking at him now and all you can think is that you’d be okay spending the rest of your life with this man. You don’t think you’d want to spend it with anyone else. And maybe that’s naive or stupid, you are only 21 after all, but damn it, if it’s not the truth.

You squeeze his hand.

“Bed, please.”

✦ ✦ ✦

March 1996

“Where is tu dulce?”

It’s a very rare day where Joel isn’t working and Sarah is at school. He told his mom that he wanted to get the apartment deep-cleaned; she came over with a bucket of cleaning supplies and a weirdly large mop.

“The high school. She’s got meetings with the teacher she works with.”

She doesn’t look at him as she wipes down the kitchen counters with a sopping washcloth. “She’s so busy. I never see her.”

He’s on the floor, chest-deep in the oven, scrubbing as much grime as he can. He did the dirty jobs, Momma did the detailed jobs. “Me neither, Ma.”

She hums.

They go back to their humming. She’s got the country radio on, some ballad by Tim McGraw is playing softly as they both hum along. It reminds him of his childhood– watching his mom and dad dance in the kitchen late at night when they thought he was asleep. It was the happiest he had ever seen his dad, the most carefree.

“Momma?”

“¿Sí, toro?”

He pushes himself out of the oven and wipes his hand on a rag he has wrapped around one of his belt loops, plopping down onto the tiled floor with a huff. She continues her task dutifully, expression relaxed.

“I wanna ask her to marry me.”

Her head whips around to him, hand stilling on the counter, “Oh!”

Anxiety scratches at his throat. He continues, “I’ve been thinking about it for a while. She– well, Momma, she’s my best friend. I wanna spend the rest of my life with her.”

There’s a moment of silence between them. She stares at him with an almost crazed look in her eye. He’s scared of her not approving; he has always begged for his mother’s approval.

“And you’ve thought hard about this? Have you discussed this with her? Have you asked her if she wants to get married?”

He’s thirteen again, criss-cross-apple-sauce on the kitchen floor while his mom moves around the space, watching her dress twirl around her ankles. She lectures him about threatening Tommy’s bullies for the millionth time and he nods whenever she looks down at him with raised eyebrows.

“Yeah, Momma. Said she wanted to get married after graduation.”

She raises her eyebrows and gives him a pointed look, “You are both quite young.”

He squares his shoulders, straightening out his back. He knows this is what he wants to do. She will agree. He knows she will.

“We’ve been together a year and a half; she’s moving in with us at the end of the semester. I think it’s time.”

She lets the washcloth flop out of her hand so that she can cross her arms over her chest. “You’ve been married before, papi. That didn’t go very well.”

He rolls his eyes, “That was out of obligation. She didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

She breaks eye contact with him, toe tapping on the ground. “Well, clearly she did, or she wouldn't have left.”

“Momma.”

Her eyes trail back over to his, a mother’s force behind her gaze. “Papi.”

“She’s different.” Of this, he is sure. He’s always been sure about you.

“I know– I want you to be happy.”

He nods, “I know.”

She stares at him for a moment– eyebrows raised, arms crossed, toe tapping– before she speaks again, a sort of smug satisfaction taking over her features.

“Joel, you will give her my ring.”

Huh?

“Wh- what?”

Pointing one finger down at him, she smiles. “My ring. I want her to have it.”

The wedding band on his mother’s left ring finger was her mother’s before it was her’s. Joel’s maternal grandmother gave it to his dad the first time she had met him, insisting that he was the man for her daughter. Momma says it was fate, but Joel thinks maybe it was because she wasn’t married yet and her mother just wanted her out of the house. Whatever the case, Momma insisted that it was the most romantic gesture of all time. This ring is important to her– more important than Joel thinks he could ever really understand– but she wants to give it to you.

“Wait– are you sure?”

She grabs a dry dish towel off the counter and smacks him on the side of the head. It doesn’t hurt, maybe just his ego. “Do not question your mother.”

“Sorry, Momma.”

She lets out a proud “hmph”, and crosses her arms in front of her chest, towel dangling from her hand still– a silent threat.

“Thank you. That’ll mean a lot to her.”

That’s the understatement of the century. Joel knows how you feel about his mother– about mothers in general, but especially his own who has shown you motherly adoration that you never got for yourself. Essie is your mother, for all intents and purposes. This would mean the world to you.

She goes back to wiping the counters down with a newfound determination.

Joel pipes back up again, “Can I ask you somethin’?”

She brings the towel back down on the top of his head, without even giving him a glance. “Stupid question.”

“Sorry.”

She shakes her head at the counter and sighs, “Stop apologizing. Ask your question.”

“Should I ask her dad for permission?”

She pauses. Conflicting emotions flit over her face– confusion, then anger, then that same crazed look from earlier, and then nothing.

“Does she talk to him?”

Shaking his head, he replies, “No– can’t remember the last time she called him.”

She nods, decision made, “Then, no. The only people’s opinion that matters is hers and Sarah’s… and maybe her loud friend’s.”

He chuckles, “Elaine?”

“Yes, la pelirroja. She will have an opinion. She is very loud with her opinions.”

“Yes, she is,” he huffs, twirling the greasy rag in between his fingers. It coats his fingers in a black tar.

“I really love her.”

When he looks back to his mother, she’s looking down at him with a smile on her face.

“I know, papi.”

His vision flits to the rag, and back up to his mother again.

“I wanna make her happy.”

Her face softens, “You already do.”

He nods. He knows.

“When are you going to ask her?”

He shrugs. “I’m not sure.”Momma’s face lights up with what he can only describe as a girlish joy. “Oh, I have an idea.”

series masterlist | masterlist of all masterlists 🌼 | eras masterlist 🌻

[moesnotifs]

delicate | d.b.

Pairing: dieter bravo x f!interviewer!reader, social media and interview transcripts

summary: Your internet show “A Little to the Right” is popular enough that you’ve been invited to interview a red carpet. What happens when Dieter Bravo shows up?

Warnings: mostly dialogue if you’re into that (because i needed a break from writing action; i am a dialogue whore); any pictures i use are for inspiration purposes only and do not reflect the reader’s appearance at all; takes place after the events of The Bubble; i had way too much fun making up dieter bravo fandom usernames; talking about Grey’s Anatomy including a spoiler for season 11 (dear god, that show is ridiculously long)

word count: 2.7k

a/n: this is lightly based on andrew and amelia having the most insane chemistry i’ve ever seen. like literally wtf is going on with those two? (/pos) not sure if i’ll ever do this again, but it was a fun way to tell a story that i’ve never done before. this is all just for shits and giggles and to slightly make fun of fandom because i’ve participated in it for most of my life and i think we all have humiliation kinks.

dieter bravo masterlist | masterlist of all masterlists🌼

My reputation's never been worse, so

You must like me for me

Is it cool that I said all that?

Is it chill that you're in my head?

'Cause I know that it's delicate

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Transcript of the first interview:

Y - “Dieter Bravo!”

D - “Hello gorgeous, what’s your name?”

You introduce yourself to him with a shy grin.

D - “Beautiful name for a beautiful woman.”

It should be noted that at this point you are already flustered.

Y - “Oh, thank you!”

D - “You’re welcome, pretty girl.”

You brush him off with a professional smile.

Y - “So, how’s it feel to win Best Actor tonight?”

D - “It feels like the best high of my life.”

Y - “Oh, really?”

You have a smirk on your face. Everyone knows Dieter Bravo’s reputation. He rolls his eyes playfully.

D - “I’ll tell you if that’s still how I feel tomorrow after the after-party.”

Y - “Okay, you let me know.”

D - “I will, I will.”

There’s a moment of quiet where you both look each other up and down. You shake it off pretty quickly though.

Y - “So, you worked on this movie for quite a while if I’m not mistaken?”

D - “Too long, but hey, y’know what?”

Y - “What?”

D - “It all worked out, because now I get to stand here next to a beautiful woman.”

You fan yourself with a hand.

Y - *slightly sarcastically* “Oh Dieter, you’re gonna make me blush.”

D - “That’s the goal, darlin’.”

You seem to notice something off screen.

Y - “Oh, I think it’s time for you to switch.”

Dieter pulls his lips down into a dramatized frown.

D - “But I don’t wanna.”

Y - “Unfortunately, that’s the rules.”

D - “Eh, rules are stupid.”

You give him a big smile, not sarcastic or condescending, a genuine smile.

Y - “Well, you’re gonna get me in trouble, Dieter.”

D - “Oh, we wouldn’t want that.”

You shake your head.

Y - “No, we wouldn’t.”

D - “Next time, pretty girl!”

He hands you his microphone and starts to walk away. You turn over your shoulder and yell back at him.

Y - “You wish, Bravo!”

The viewer can hear Dieter’s muffled hyena-laugh as he walks away.

Comments:

dieterydoo is it just me or is the chemistry insane?

dbscontroversiallyyounggf no one talk to me

bravocanhitthis him calling her pretty girl is CRAZY for it being the first time they’ve ever met

moeswriting oh this is going to be my roman empire i fear

rightytightyleftyloosey i have never seen her go this off-track with someone before. he had her so flustered lol

daddyissuesoops THIS WAS TOO SHORT I NEED MORE

↳ alittletotheright that’s what she said 

(note: This is the only comment on this video that you responded to, nor do you bring up Dieter again after this until you see him again three months later.)

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Transcript of the second interview:

Dieter approaches you from behind you, where you can’t see him. He has a very large grin on his face.

D - “Oh my god, it’s my pretty girl!”

You turn to look at him with an equally large grin, like you’d been waiting for him.

Y - “Your pretty girl?”

D - “Yeah, sweetheart. My pretty girl.”

Y - “This is– what?– the second time we’ve ever talked to each other?”

D - “What can I say, baby? When you know, you know.”

Y - “Oh, you know, do you?”

D - “Yup. Can’t deny the tension we’ve got goin’ on. Everybody can see it.”

You willfully ignore him by changing the subject.

Y - “So, you’re up for Best Supporting Actor tonight, right?”

D - “Yes, I am. Got some good competitors, but I have high hopes.”

Y - *in a stage whisper* “Don’t tell anybody, but I’m rooting for you.”

D - *in a stage whisper* “I would never betray you by telling everyone just how obsessed you are with me, but I think they all already know.”

Y - “I’m not obsessed with you. I just think that you’re a good actor.”

D - “Okay, pretty girl, you keep telling yourself that.”

You jokingly go to snatch his microphone out of his hand with a giggle, but he dodges out of the way with a “HA!” He runs slightly away from you, but still in the camera’s line of sight.

D - *gasps* What are you doing?”

Y - *yelling over the cacophony* “Taking away your ability to speak to me.”

D - *yelling over the cacophony* “I don’t need a microphone to speak to you.”

Y - *yelling over the cacophony* “You do on a red carpet, Dieter.”

He walks back over to you and screws his face up like he’s about to cry, but it’s obvious he’s just being dramatic.

D - *pretend sobbing* “She hates me.”

Y - “Oh, I do not.”

D - *pretend sobbing* “Audience, she hates me. I thought she loved me.”

Y - “Well, I don’t love you either.”

Dieter’s mouth drops into an O and he makes a dramatic show of pretending to stab himself in the chest.

D - “I’ve been stabbed! A direct hit to the heart and the ego!”

You stare the camera dead in the lens like you’re on The Office.

Y - “This has been me interviewing Dieter Bravo. He’s going to give me his microphone and he’s going to walk away now.”

D - “AH!” *pretends to stab himself again*

You hold a hand out for the microphone and he reluctantly drops it in your hand.

Y - “Goodbye, Dieter.”

Now it’s Dieter staring down the lens of the camera. He leans down to talk into your microphone that you still have propped up to your lips.

D - “Never trust a woman with your heart. She’ll stomp it to pieces.”

You push him away from your microphone with a hand pressed to the side of his head and a big goofy grin stretching your cheeks.

Y - *through a barely-contained giggle* “Goodbye, Dieter.”

This interaction can barely be heard as Dieter walks away.

D - “Next time, pretty girl.”

Y - “You wish, Bravo.”

Comments:

youwishbravo i need 8 to 10 business days to recover from this

rightytightyleftyloosey i’m going to stick them in a room until they kiss

↳ dbscontroversiallyyounggf knowing dieter, that would take approximately one second

alittletotheleftbravo you know she comes prepared with actual questions to ask dieter and he doesn’t even give her the chance to pick up the notecard

↳ imalittletothewacky which sucks because her questions usually are actually kinda fun ↳ alittletotheleftbravo but you can’t deny that this is a cute interaction ↳ imalittletothewacky oh no one can deny that, i just wonder what she would ask him given the chance ↳ alittletotheright fun fact: i do, in fact, have many questions prepared to ask dieter and he does, in fact, never give me the chance to ask them. maybe someday.

moeswriting get dieter bravo on a little to the right RIGHT NOW

bravodieter i swear i’m not usually a crybaby, but this woman just does things to me

↳ alittletotheright oh, don’t deny being a crybaby, emotionally available men are hot ↳ bravocanhitthis EXCUSE ME?????

₊✩‧₊˚౨ৎ˚₊✩‧₊

₊✩‧₊˚౨ৎ˚₊✩‧₊

Transcript of the interview:

Y - “Hello.”

D - “Hi.”

Pause. Heavy staring ensues.

D - “You’re really gonna just sit there and stare at me. Isn’t it like your whole job to talk to me?”

Y - “Yes. It is.”

D - “Then say something, weirdo.”

Y - “No. You say something.”

D - “Okay, fine, I will say something!”

Y - “Okay, then say something!”

Pause. Dieter points accusingly at you.

D - “I’ve been begging her to date me.”

Y - “Yes, you have and it’s mildly disturbing.”

D - “Wha– Me!? Mildly disturbing?!”

Y - “Yes, Dieter, you. Mildly disturbing.”

D - “That’s rude. I should just leave.”

Y - “Are you going to?”

Pause. Dieter gives you an unserious scowl.

D - “No. Obviously not.”

Y - “Good for you.”

D - “Ask your questions.”

Y - “Hm.”

D - “Don’t ‘hm’ me. Ask your questions.”

Y - “What’s your favorite thing to hate-watch?”

D - “Grey’s Anatomy.”

Y - “Seriously?”

D - “Seriously.”

Y - “That show is good.”

D - “No. It used to be good.”

Y - “Oh? You wanna elaborate?”

D - “As soon as Derek dies, it’s unwatchable.”

Y - “Spoilers!”

D - “Oh my god, it’s been almost ten years since that episode came out.”

Y - “Still!”

D - “Get over yourself, babe.”

It should be noted at this point that you won’t stop giggling, even though arguably Dieter isn’t saying anything funny.

Y - “Why do you still watch it?”

D - “Because it’s nice to know that my life could be a lot worse.”

Y - “That’s horribly morbid.”

D - “I also just like the drama of it all.”

Y - “Well, of course. You’re you.”

D - “Well, obviously.”

Y - “Who’s your favorite character?”

D - “Derek or Meredith.”

Y - *sarcastically* “Woah, that’s a really controversial choice. I can’t believe you just said that.”

D - “Hey! I like Meredith’s dark and twisty and I like Derek ‘cause he’s hot. I thought this was a judgment-free zone.”

Y - “Who the fuck said that?”

D - “Well, no one, I guess I just assumed.”

Y - “Well, you know what they said about assuming.”

D - *sarcastically* “Haha, very funny.”

All you do is flash a large grin at him in response.

D - “Well, who’s your favorite character?!”

Y - “Christina.”

D - “Now, I wouldn’t really call that very original either.”

Y - “I didn’t say it was original. I’m just stating the fact that Christina Yang is the best Grey’s character.”

D - “Oh, whatever.”

Y - “Well, who’s your least favorite character?”

D - “Sloan. No question.”

Y - “Well, that’s horribly ironic.”

D - “How so?”

Y - “Are you– are you being serious?”

D - “Yes?”

Y - “If I picked one Grey’s Anatomy character that you were most like, I would say Mark Sloan.”

D - *gasps* “No fucking way. Now, that’s just mean.”

You put your hands up in defense.

Y - “Sorry, sweetie. Face the facts. You are a Mark-Sloan-man-whore.”

Dieter doesn’t respond. He looks you up and down slowly.

D - “You’re ridiculously attractive, did you know that?”

Y - “Did you know that you’re a pain in my ass?”

D - “Yes. I did.”

Y - “If I made you sing karaoke right now, what song would you sing?”

D - “None. I’d burst your eardrums, baby. I can’t sing for shit.”

Y - “Okayyyy, but if you could sing, what would it be?”

Pause. Dieter is pretending to think dramatically with a finger tapping his lips.

D - “Blank Space.”

Y - “Good choice.” D - “Thank you. And what about you?”

Y - “Hmm. Depends on my mood.”

D - “Okay, what song would you sing based on your mood right this very second?”

Y - “Hmmm. You & I by One Direction.”

D - “You’re in a love song kind of mood?”

Y - “No. I just like One Direction.”

Dieter has a very large smirk on his face.

D - “Mhm. Everybody does.”

You have an equally large smirk on your face.

Y - “Bravo.”

D - “Yes?”

Y - “Stop looking at me like that.”

D - “Like what, baby?”

Y - “Like you’re gonna jump my bones.”

D - “And would that be a bad thing?”

Y - “I mean, there are cameras filming us, so probably.”

D - “Don’t wanna make a porno with me?”

You are shifting in your seat, with your hands wringing together on the desk.

Y - “Not particularly.”

D - “Are you sure about that?”

Y - “Yes, I am.”

D - “Okay, pretty girl.”

Y - “Okay.”

D - “Ask me another question.”

Y - “Okay.”

You shift around in your seat again and click your nails on the desk.

Y - “Give me a random fact about anything.”

D - “Hm.”

Dieter looks up as he thinks.

D - “Did you know there’s a room full of penises in the Vatican?”

You raise your eyebrows in question.

Y - “Excuse me?”

D - “The Vatican had a whole campaign in 1563 where they chopped off the penises of statues from the Romans and Greeks because they thought nudity was immoral. But! Because they thought the statues were so beautiful, they couldn’t get themselves to get rid of the penises so they stuffed the bronze and marble dicks in a bunch of vases and stuffed them in a room.”

Y - “Is that true?”

D - “That’s the rumor.”

Y - “Of course, the first fun fact you can think of is about penises.”

D - “It’s a fact about the destruction of art committed by the Catholic Church that also just happens to be about penises.”

Y - “I petition we stop talking about penises, Dieter.”

He holds his hands up like he’s being held at gunpoint.

D - “Whatever you want.”

Y - “That is what I want.”

D - “Am I allowed to ask you questions?”

Y - “Um, I guess. But I highly doubt it would make the cut, so it’d be kind of a waste of time.”

D - “Not to me. Not if I get to learn about you.”

You pause, obviously flustered.

Y - “Go ahead.”

D - “What’s your ideal first date?”

You glare at him.

D - “You said I could ask a question!”

Y - “I feel like it was implied that it shouldn’t be a question like that.”

D - “Okay, what kind of question did you want?”

Y - “I don’t know, like something about my life. You’re the one who wanted to ask me a question!”

D - “And how was my first question not about your life?”

Y - “Not about my love life!”

D - “Okay, okay. Umm, give me one reason you won’t date me.”

Y - “That’s about my love life.”

D - “Oh, do you consider me to be a part of your love life?”

This transcript writer is pretty sure that if looks could kill, Dieter would be dead by now.

Y - “I won’t date you because I don’t need drama in my life.”

D - “You interview celebrities for a living. You are surrounded by drama. Give me a real reason.”

Y - “Because I don’t want to.”

D - “Why not?”

Y - “Because I like you too much.”

D - “Huh.”

Y - “I don’t want you to disappoint me.”

D - “And how would I do that?”

Y - “By being an ass.”

D - “What if I promised not to be an ass?”

Y - “Are you even capable of that?”

D - “I could be, especially for you.”

Pause. You just stare at Dieter with a dopey smile on your face.

Y - “What’s the most normal, every-day, human thing that you’ve never done?”

D - *in a sing-songy voice* “Changing the subject…”

Y - *in a sing-songy voice* “Shut up and answer the question.”

Dieter takes a second to think before he gives you his answer.

D - “I’ve never done the dishes.”

Y - “What?!”

D - “Not once in my whole life.”

Y - “How?”

D - “I’m a nepobaby, pretty girl.”

Y - “I don’t know how that’s possible.”

D - “It’s very possible.”

Y - “Okay, well now I feel morally obligated to make you learn how to do the dishes.”

D - “You wanna teach me?”

Y - “I think I have to.”

D - “I have a proposal.”

Y - “Oh?”

D - “Let me make you dinner and then you can teach me how to do the dishes.”

Y - “Are you serious?”

D - “Extremely.”

There’s a long pause where Dieter grins at you while you stare at him with a small smile.

Y - “Okay.”

Dieter is gobsmacked.

D - “What?”

Y - “I said ‘okay’.”

D - “Wh- why?”

Y - “Well, someone has to make you do the dishes, Mr. Nepobaby.”

Dieter stares at you with a disbelieving smile.

D - “Okay.”

Y - “Okay.”

The interview ends with a photo of Dieter doing the dishes with a dramatic frown on his face in your tiny kitchen, pink plastic gloves on and an apron that says “Kiss My Ass” tied around his waist.

Comments:

bravocanhitthis literally what the fuck

bravocanhitthis my dreams have come true

daddyissuesoops her calling dieter a manwhore… real

dbscontroversiallyyounggf why am i blushing? i wasn’t even a part of this conversation

dietersvaticanpeens i don’t think we’re acknowledging dieter’s fun fact enough… like what do you mean there’s a room full of penis vases in the vatican?

alittletotheleftbravo she is a much stronger person than i am, i would’ve jumped across the table as soon as he suggested making a porno

moeswriting i have never rooted for a celebrity couple more in my whole life

rightytightyleftyloosey “because i like you too much” excuse me??? why aren’t more people talking about this???

bravodieter next time, pretty girl

↳ alittletotheright you wish, bravo ↳ dieterydoo get a room???

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[moesnotifs]

good morning, miller | mine one-shot

this is a part of my series Mine. i highly suggest reading that first to make sense of the little things in this fic. takes place between chapters three and four.

pairing: mine!Joel Miller x f!reader

summary: mornings with the millers,

or sarah’s first day of kindergarten

warnings: doesn’t really make complete sense unless you’ve read Mine, unbelievable amounts of fluff, joel miller is a grumpy boy without his coffee :(, sarah miller doesn’t need coffee– she’s hoarded all the energy (what the fuck, she just stole mine– SARAH GIVE IT BACK!!!!), reader needs some iced tea and a nap, mention of breakfast food (bacon, eggs, that kinda stuff), reader is wearing  Joel’s shirt (described as “fitting you well”, no other description), some subtle hints to Sarah having some really intense ADHD but it’s never said explicitly

word count: 2k

a/n: a little treat for all y’all who waited so long for chapter three <3

series masterlist | read on ao3

✦ ✦ ✦

August 14th, 1995

“DADDY!” With a scream, something light flops down onto his chest, startling him awake.

“Daddy. Daddy. Daddy. DAD!” Sarah emphasizes each word with a bounce, pushing the air out of his lungs.

When he creaks his eyes open, dust piled in the corners of them, it’s bright– sun shining through the window on the side of his bed and warming his bare back. He would give anything for another hour in bed.

“Dad,” she draws out, grabbing the sides of his face and pushing his cheeks together, “It’s my first day of school. You need to get up! Sugar is making breakfast, so you need to get up.”

She’s already dressed and ready to go– hair puffy, but pushed out of her face with her favorite pink butterfly clips, a pink shirt with a few Care Bears on it and jean overalls with little strawberries on the front pocket. It’s very clear to him that you’ve done this since everything looks coordinated and doesn’t clash like it usually does when he dresses her and it isn’t her princess dress, which is what Sarah would’ve put on if she had dressed herself. He wishes you were still in bed with him– he can feel your absence like a missing limb, like a vital part of him is gone. 

His voice comes out muffled, since she’s squishing his cheeks, when he replies, “O’ay, ‘m up.”

She lets out a yelp of excitement, jumps off him, and slides off his tall bed and onto the floor. The only part of her that he can see as she runs out of the room is the top of her hair as it bounces around the bed and out of the door.

When his feet hit the hardwood floor, he shivers. It’s cold, much too cold without you next to him.

He pulls a pair of jeans off the floor and slips them on. Where’s that stupid shirt he threw last night? Whatever– he’ll put a shirt on later.

Stepping out of his room is heavenly. It smells like the diner, but so, so much better and it’s warmer, so much warmer.

He follows the scent into the kitchen, shuffling his tired feet through the hallway and to the entryway to the kitchen, leaning on the wall.

There you are, humming along with the buzzy radio attached to the bottom of the cabinet and pushing scrambled eggs around a pan. You’re wearing gray sweatpants and a blue shirt that fits you well– that’s where his shirt went. 

He thinks it’s a Madonna song playing, but he can’t really tell through Sarah’s rambling she’s spewing at you from the kitchen table.

“Maddie from preschool is going to the same school as me. I think that’s really cool. I wonder if she’ll play princesses with me. Do you think she’ll play princesses with me?”

You turn to look at her over your shoulder and nod, “Yeah, baby. I bet she does. Just make sure you ask, okay?”

“Okay– I think she will too. Remember to ask, remember to ask.” She pushes a finger into the middle of her forehead, as if to force her thoughts to the forefront of her mind.

You nod again, “You’ll remember– just be patient with yourself.”

Sarah starts mumbling to herself and counting her fingers– he cannot even begin to imagine what is going on in her big brain.

While turning your face back to the stove, you catch his eye and a smile takes over your face.

God, what he wouldn’t do to see that smile everyday. He can’t believe that the sight of him makes you look so damn beautiful.

“Good morning, Miller.”

He can’t find it within himself to put effort into forming words with his mouth. Too much energy. He grumbles nonsense instead.

You huff out a breath of amusement, “Come on, grump– I made coffee for you.”

Coffee. That’s what he needs: coffee.

He shuffles further into the kitchen. He feels like a fucking zombie. He’d bet a million bucks he looks like one too.

Without even looking, you hold out a mug of coffee towards him, the other hand pulling the eggs off the heat. He mumbles a thanks and takes it out of your hand.

Oh, he’s so glad you know just how to make his coffee. It’s heaven on his taste buds. Black, not too hot, not too cold. He can already feel the caffeine kick starting his brain.

Placing his mug down, the green one that proudly displays “World’s Best Dad” (something his brother had bought him as a joke when he first found out about Amanda being pregnant– it hadn’t been funny at the time, but he really liked the mug now), he grabs your waist from behind and snuggles his nose into your neck. His eyes slip closed at the comfort he feels being near you.

“G’mornin’.”

You turn your head and press a kiss into his bed-mussed hair, “Morning, baby.”

“Thank you for gettin’ Guppy ready for school.”

You shuffle around in his arms. He’s clearly in the way of you moving around efficiently, but you don’t say anything and neither does he.

“It’s no problem. I woke up earlier than usual and I figured you should sleep in a little. You haven’t gotten enough sleep lately.”

You’re right. You’re always right. Because Tommy’s been gone for two months now, he’s had to pick up the slack with their contracting stuff. He can’t stop doing it, it’s the only way he can afford to feed Sarah and register her for school and keep up with rent. His income from the diner isn’t enough anymore.

It’s fine though. He’ll do it. Anything to keep Sarah happy, healthy, and fed.

But it’s taking quite the toll on his body. He’s way too young to be feeling this damn old.

All he does in response to you is nod into your shoulder and sigh.

“Go sit. I made you a plate.”

He lets go of you, instantly feeling the loss, before he flops down onto the chair next to Sarah.

“Good morning, Guppy,” he mumbles through a sleepy smile, “What’re you doin’?”

She doesn’t even look up to respond to him, still intensely staring down at her fingers, “Counting.”

“Countin’ what?”

You place his forgotten coffee mug and a plate in front of him. It’s filled with bacon, scrambled eggs, and a handful of cut strawberries. You’ve been getting on his ass about being a good example with his eating habits– “You need to eat more fruit and vegetables or Sarah’s going to think that what you normally eat is an acceptable diet.”

He ate them because you asked him to. He knew you were beyond stressed lately, what with starting your senior year of college and getting ready for student teaching next semester. You didn’t need another thing like what he ate to stress you out even more.

“How many friends from preschool I have in my class. Three.”

He takes another sip of his coffee, “I bet that number goes up a lot by the end of today.”

She smiles up at him as he sticks a strawberry in his mouth, “I hope so.”

You chime in, sliding into the chair across from Sarah, “I know so. You’ll have to tell me all about school and how super cool it is when I come over on Wednesday.”

“Wednesday?! You’re not coming back until Wednesday,” she shrieks, throwing her hands up in the air.

He thinks that if he didn’t know that sometimes you needed to be by yourself in your own space sometimes and this was the first time you’d told him you weren’t coming back for two days, he would be reacting the same way Sarah was.

You look freaked out for a second with your eyebrows raised and your eyes wide, before your expression cools, “I got school too, Guppy.”

“But– how I supposed remember all the stuff happens today so I can tell you on Wednesday?” She forgets a few words in her need to get out what she wants to say quickly, a common occurrence with his five-year-old.

You shake your head at her, “It’s okay if you forget. That big brain of yours is gonna keep it all stashed in there, you just might need a little reminder to jog your memory.”

Joel butts in, hopefully to take some of the heat off you, “We could write it all down, just in case.”

She takes a minute to think about it, finger pressed into her temple. You both watch as she comes to a conclusion and nods her head definitively. “Okay. But we have to write it down right after school, Daddy. I don’t wanna forget.”

He mimics her nod, “Of course, Guppy.”

You spend the rest of the time that he spends finishing his breakfast singing whatever songs come on the radio and leading Sarah in an uncoordinated dance around the kitchen as she throws her head back with the force of her giggles.

He wishes everyday could be like this. Waking up to you in his apartment. In bed or greeting him in the kitchen– it didn’t matter to him. As long as you were here, he was happy and so was his little girl.

He throws a shirt on (not the one you stole, he insists you keep that one on) and guides his girls out of the second-story apartment and down onto the street. It’s bustling with activity as people come to the busy downtown street to get to work and get errands done.

Sarah’s already hopping down the street, her pink Elmo backpack being jostled up and down with her as she bounces, while he locks the door behind them.

“Sarah,” you call for her, gesturing with the hand you don’t have placed on his lower back for her to come back.

She obeys, but she does so reluctantly. Her hands wrap around her backpack straps and her head faces the concrete below her.

“You gotta hold Daddy’s hand, remember?” He holds a hand out for her to take when she’s standing next to him again. He’s been trying to really hammer this point home to her for years now, to get her to remember, but she has a harder time focusing when she’s really excited. He doesn’t mind– she just needs to be reminded.

“Yes…” She slaps her palm into his and clamps down her tiny fingers in between his thumb and his pointer finger.

“Thank you, baby.”

You start your trek down the street. Sarah was going to the grade school that was on your college campus, the one that the education students helped teach at occasionally. You assured him that you knew a lot of the people that would be interacting with Sarah and that they were all fantastic. It just made him nervous sometimes, but he trusted you.

“Can I hold Sugar’s hand too?”

You beam down at her, “Of course.”

When you give her your hand, she insists that you both swing her, which, of course you do because you both are wrapped around her comically small pinkie finger.

He successfully drops her off with no tears, which he doesn’t know how he managed considering he had cried to you the previous night about how weird it was that his little girl was going to school now and that she wouldn’t have any family around her there like she always did. You had assured him that going to school would be a fun new adventure for her. Sarah was such a social butterfly that she could fit in anywhere. He just didn’t want her to grow up.

He takes you to your dorm room and says good morning to Elaine, who’s snuggled deep in Robin’s chest and barely acknowledges his existence. You give him a long kiss and tell him that you’ll see him on Wednesday. Wednesday could not come sooner.

When he punches his timecard at work later that morning, he sighs in disbelief at how big his little girl was growing– at how much he would give for another morning just like this one. Maybe someday.

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[moesnotifs]

I UPLOADED CHAPTER THREE OF MINE!!!! yayayayayyay

mine | 3. we'll never make my parents mistakes

pairing: young!no-outbreak!joel miller x f!reader

chapter summary: you and joel are finding things out about each other’s pasts and figuring out how to deal with your presents,

or meeting sarah miller and the after effects

warnings: THIS CHAPTER EXPLORES SOME VERY DARK THINGS BUT IS ALSO VERY SOFT, READ AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION AND PLEASE READ THE WARNINGS; discussion of maternal suicide/postpartum depression, alcoholism, and parental neglect (reader); joel is 22 and reader is 20; reader is described a small amount (has hair, able-bodied, wears feminine clothing, is going to school for secondary english education, has a heavily-detailed background); joel being The Single Dad™; character joins the army, conversation about a dead father and general daddy issues for the Miller brothers, including military PTSD and fraternal death from lung cancer; tommy being a little shit; HEY THESE TWO IDIOTS HAVE SEX!!! (not explicit)

word count: 11.5k

a/n: happy late birthday to my favorite fictional boy, have some trauma <3 this has been a long time coming (u see what i did there? ;) ). to all who have been begging me for the next chapter in my inbox, this is for you <3 . again, just wanna say: please read the warnings on this chapter. i am not usually a “traumatize my characters” kind of writer, but i was feeling feral while writing this over the past few weeks and it kind of just happened… so be warned. (i’m sorry in advance)

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Flash forward, and we're takin' on the world together

And there's a drawer of my things at your place

You learn my secrets and you figure out why I'm guarded

You say we'll never make my parents' mistakes

✦ ✦ ✦

November 1994

It’s a couple days later. A Tuesday. Arguably the worst day of the week and a day that he’s been dreading since the text had graced his flip phone that night.

“... we need to talk”??

It sent shivers down his spine, made him want to run and hide, and never leave his apartment again. Talking wasn’t really Joel’s strong suit– sure, he could sweet talk Mrs. Nelson into giving him a better tip, but talking about how he felt? God, it was like dragging his toddler around a store when she wanted to go home– frustrating and near-impossible.

You’d texted him afterwards, making plans to meet at the diner when his shift was almost over to talk. But the past two days had been an absolute blur.

Sarah had noticed her dad’s change in demeanor and had decided to follow him into it, nonstop crying and small fists banging on the floor and his chest and anything she could take her anger out on. It made sleeping borderline impossible. He has had to sit in her small bed with her laying on his chest until she wore herself out the past two nights.

But here he is, at his usual Tuesday shift just after the lunch crowd has dispersed and he’s hiding in the kitchen while Don gives him a lecture about something that he’s honestly not listening to. He does, however, catch the sound of the bell ringing as someone walks into the diner and then he hears your cheery voice as you speak to someone.

“Go out there, there’s a customer,” Don says as he cleans the grill.

“I–” He cuts himself off. He doesn’t want Don to know about what’s about to happen.

The burly man looks up at him, nearly a foot shorter than him and he still scares the crap out of him sometimes, “It’s your girl, isn’t it?”

Joel clears his throat and sighs, “Yeah.”

“You two been fighting?”

He shakes his head.

Don slices his hand through the air as if to push Joel’s gesture aside. “Bullshit. I can tell.”

“Wha–”

“You been actin’ different. I’ve known you almost four years, Miller. I could tell when you started datin’ her and I could tell yesterday when you came into work that something was wrong.”

Damn Don and his out-of-character perceptiveness.

“Go face her, Miller.” He nods once, a finality to it.

“I-”

“Get out of my kitchen, you coward!”

He pushes him out of the swinging doors and into the dining area. When he sees you, he freezes.

✦ ✦ ✦

You arrive at the diner at three and sit in your usual spot by the window that no one else likes but you. It’s bright. You think maybe that’s why no one likes it, but you adore the way the reflected light warms you down to your toes. It’s quiet– weirdly quiet, like even the building itself is getting ready in anticipation for whatever is about to happen. The only other patron is Mr. Cassini sitting in a corner with a cup of coffee cradled in his trembling hands. You wonder where Doreen is.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Cassini,” you yell across the diner.

His face lights up, like it always does when he sees you, “Hello, dear! How are you doin’?”

“Oh, I’m doing as good as I can. How about you?”

“Oh darlin’, I’m doing amazing. Best I’ve felt in years.”

You smile at him, “That’s amazing, Mr. Cassini.”

“Oh, look at me talkin’ you up when you probably have work to do. I’ll let you get to your studying.”

You huff, “Thanks, Mr. Cassini.”

You can hear clattering coming from the kitchen. You suppose that’s where Joel is, or where he’s hiding. You’d tried to get a grasp on how Joel was feeling about all of this when you had been texting him to make the plans to meet here after his shift. Text messages aren’t very good at communicating emotion, but you couldn’t get yourself to call him– face him.

“Get out of my kitchen, you coward,” you hear Don yell in his obnoxiously loud way, a deep chortle following Joel as he exits the swinging doors.

He freezes like a statue, eyes wide and brows raised. Tired is the word that comes to mind– he so obviously hasn’t slept right in days. Bags under his eyes, shoulders slouched, skin paler than his usual tan glow. Maybe he’d seen a ghost.

He looks at you with his evaluating stare. You always wonder what Joel sees when he does this. Does he know how terrified you are?

Turning around, he points a finger towards the counter and grabs a clean glass from the cabinet behind him. You sigh, sling your backpack over your shoulder, and get up to go sit where Joel directed you to. He likes it when you’re closer to him while you visit him at work, especially if it’s slow and he’s bored, but when you need to study or do homework, you sit at the booth by the window– less distractions, you tell him. Really, you just know you won’t get any work done if you have easy access to him and you like the noise of the diner while you’re studying.

He doesn’t turn back towards you until you’re already settled in the tall stool, backpack precariously balanced on the seat next to you. Sliding the glass across the counter towards you, now full of iced tea exactly how you like it, he sighs.

“Hey, sugar.”

His nervousness surrounds him– hand pulling through his sweaty, messy hair, lidded eyes darting around the diner in an effort to find something to distract himself with, teeth worrying his bleeding lower lip between them. 

“Hey,” you breathe out. In a way, his nerves comfort you– you’re not the only one.

“I got another few minutes before Don will let me out.”

“I know, Joel,” you mutter.

“Gotta wait for Dorreen to come back from her smoke break too.”

“Okay,” you whisper.

He leans on the counter, facing you, “I’m nervous.”

You give him a soft smile, “Me too.”

“Good. Good.” He nods to himself, pushing a straw towards you from the apron around his waist.

“Miller! I need more coffee,” Mr. Cassini’s gravely voice echoes through the empty diner, making Joel jump up from his position on the counter.

“One second, Mr. Cassini–” he holds up a finger directed at you– “I’ll be right back. Gotta do a couple things before I leave.”

You know. You nod.

You pull a book out of your bag, The Secret Garden, desperate to avoid the awkwardness of the quiet. You absorb yourself in the story of Mary as she explores the hidden garden her new caretaker’s late wife once walked, dead and gray. It’s the millionth time you’ve read it– page corners bent and the spine cracked in multiple places. The pages are a dark yellow, almost matching the deep color of the faded cover. On the front page, the name Virginia swirls in a beautiful cursive right above your own name in your not-so-delicate print. The ink of her fountain pen is a deeper black than the one of your ball-point, faded by the twelve years it had sat on the page.

A hand pops into your field of vision and taps on the page of your book, “Ready to go.”

You hum and stash the book into your bag, between your hardback textbooks so it gets better protection from the mess that is your bookbag.

You watch Joel pull his apron off and stuff it under the counter, exposing the parts of his jeans that have gone untouched by the mess of his shift. The square outline around his crotch almost makes you giggle, but you bite your lip to suppress it.

He comes around the counter and, without looking in your direction, pushes open the front door. Following behind him like a puppy, you quickly do the same, throwing your backpack over your shoulder.

He stops suddenly, turning around, looking for guidance.

You sigh, “Let me walk you home.”

“No–”

“What direction is it?”

He looks you up and down, a habit you guess he learned from trying to determine if he needed to make Tommy back down from a fight or not. His hesitation is so blatant, bringing his hand up once, twice, before he points in the opposite direction from the route he takes to walk you back to your dorm. Of course, he was going out of his way to bring you home. That is the most Joel thing you could think of.

“Let’s go.”

You start to walk, determined steps taking you down the street. You turn to look at Joel over your shoulder and he hasn’t moved an inch. Your footsteps falter.

“Really?”

He huffs out a breath, “I– I just–”

You shrug your arms up, exasperated, and slap them back against your sides, “What, Joel?”

“I don’t… I’m not ready to do this yet.”

What?

You furrow your brows and squint in his direction through the waning sunlight.

“What in the world are you talking about?”

He runs a hand through his curly, sweaty hair, sucks in a large breath, and slurs his words together in one long exhale, “I’m not ready for you to meet her yet.”

Oh. Oh.

“Joel, that’s not– that’s not what I was trying to do. I just wanted to walk you home.”

Now that he’s admitted his secret to you, that other part of him no longer hidden, everything about him is so obviously catered to a four-year-old. His expressions are controlled, but also so kind and open, like he’s keeping his real feelings at bay but wants to make sure you know that you can tell him anything and he’ll listen. His shoulders are hunched over from hard work, but he never falters, he always shows up for you, for Sarah. He’s nervous in everything he does, whether he shows it or not, but he would do anything to make sure his friends and family get whatever they need. He’d fight a bull for you if you asked him to. He’d tear the earth in two for his baby, you can tell.

This is the same Joel you’ve come to like. He hasn’t changed into a whole new person just because you learned he’s a father. He was a father the whole time you’ve known him, which is weird to think about. What else didn’t you know about him?

You continue, dragging your feet back to him, “I would never, ever try to force you into anything– especially when it comes to your daughter. I have no right to demand anything.”

“I do want you to meet ‘er.”

“I want to meet her too.”

“Someday. I jus’… not now. I need to make sure we– I wanna make sure we’ll last before I introduce someone else into her life.”

“And I agree with you.”

“Good.”

“Yup.” You kick a rock in front of you.

You both stare at each other, waiting to see who will break the silence first. 

Joel tilts his head in the direction he had originally pointed in, “Can we go somewhere to talk?”

You nod. 

The two of you walk in silence to a park down the road. You wonder if his apartment is near.

There are a few benches scattered around the park, surrounded by flowers and shrubs alike. A playground is busy with children as they scream and chase after each other with smiles on their faces.

He flops down on a bench facing a water fountain, far enough from the kids that you’re pretty sure they won’t hear you.

You sigh, pressing your palms into your eyes as you join him, small flakes of wood on the old bench press into the backs of your thighs.

“I’m upset that you didn’t tell me right away– I just want you to know that.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

Apologizing is good. An explanation would be better.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

He crosses his arms, staring out at the glaring sun, “‘Cause I didn’ want you to run.”

You scoff and scuff the concrete beneath you with your sneaker in emphasis, “What makes you think I would’ve run?”

His eyes dart over to you. He gives you a look that screams, “Are you seriously asking me that?” Eyebrows furrowed and nose scrunched.

“‘Could tell you were nervous when I first met ya. And I knew you were young and in college and most college-aged girls aren’t interested in gettin’ in a relationship with a dad.”

“Oh, I know for a fact that that is not true,” you huff, mirroring his position– slouched, arms crossed. You knew plenty of women your age who would love the stability and the experience– knew Elaine had had a few chance encounters with DILFs she had met at the bar. She claimed it was some of the best sex she’d ever had.

He scoffs, “Whatever, you know what I mean.”

You roll your eyes, “Yeah, I do.”

Rubbing his hands together, he continues.

“I wasn’t tryin’ to keep her from you forever. I was always going to tell you.”

You flatten your lips into a line. “Yeah, well, it would’ve been nice to know from the get-go.”

He’s looking you in the eye again with a genuinity and softness and places a hand on your thigh. “I’m sorry. I don’t think I’ll stop apologizing for that for a long time. I just– it seemed like the right thing to do at the time.”

You sigh, placing your hand on top of his, a smirk starting to take over your lips, “I’m not going to say it’s okay, but I might be willing to forgive you.”

His eyebrows quirk up, “Might be?”

You fix your posture, now sitting taller than him, and look down into his pretty eyes, “You take me out again and I might be willing to look past this indiscretion.”

He opens his mouth to speak again, but you interrupt before he gets the chance, pointing a defiant finger in his face– “But–! You have to promise me you won’t keep shit from me anymore. We gotta lay it all on the table. I’m not going to do this with you unless you’re honest with me.”

He nods, “I think I can do that– both of those.”

You nod, “Good, I’m glad we’re on the same page.”

He fixes his slouch so that he’s level with you again, his hand never leaving the comfort of your own.

“But, y’know that means you have to be honest with me too.”

You furrow your eyebrows.

Turning his hand so your palms face each other, he laces your fingers together and squeezes. “I know you’re hiding stuff from me too. Big stuff.”

You hum. 

“Why won’t you talk about your family?”

Well, shit.

You sigh, squeezing your eyes shut, “Oh.”

“Yeah, ‘oh’... but we don’t have to do this right now.” His eyes are wide with fear, scared he might have pushed you too hard. Maybe he has. But, it’s weird, for the first time in your entire life, you want to share things about your past.

“No, it’s okay. Might as well,” you reply, taking your hand out of his and rubbing your eyes aggressively with your palms.

Without looking up at him, you start, “I– I don’t really have much family. It’s just pretty much been me and my dad since I can remember.”

“You said your dad lives back in Seattle, right?”

“Yeah. He uh– he isn’t my favorite person. That’s why– that’s why I don’t talk about him.”

He doesn’t say anything, giving you time to think about what you’re going to say next.

“My mom died a couple weeks after she gave birth to me. She– she, uh–”

It’s hard to spit it out. To talk about it. Only a few people knew about what really happened– the rest all just knew she was dead. But you know that Joel should know– know why this is so hard for you.

“She had postpartum depression really, really bad. Couldn’t get out of bed, couldn’t shower, couldn’t eat, couldn’t feed me or hold me or look at me– Dad says she was like a statue, like a ghost of herself.”

You can’t get yourself to look at him– can feel the guilt running down your spine and into your bone marrow like it always does when you think of her. You hide your face behind your hands, elbows leaning on your legs.

“She had been so excited. They both were. Just out of college and newlyweds– dad says her pregnancy was the best year of their relationship.”

You gear yourself up for what you’re about to say. You’ve only ever told one person about this before: Elaine, and that was after a year of friendship. You’ve only known Joel for a little over a month. But, you want to tell him– need to tell him.

“But she– she killed herself. Didn’t leave a note or anything, she was just… gone.”

You can’t see his face, don’t want to. You’ve seen enough sympathetic eyes to last a lifetime of grief. “Oh, sugar…”

You shake your head in your hands– you’re not done yet. “Dad was pretty much gone after that. I never remember a time when he was ‘there’, but my grandmother said he used to be different– ‘more alive’.

“I knew he blamed me before he ever said it. He’d drop me off at my grandmother’s house and disappear for days and when she died and that wasn’t an option anymore, he would just leave me at the house with a ten dollar bill for food for a couple days at a time.”

He scoffs, like  your father could hear his anger from here. “That’s not fair–”

You cut him off, you don’t want to hear one more person say your life isn’t fair, “And when he was home, he was angry all the time. He has his good days, but he– he’s not my favorite person.

“So, that’s why I was scared when you told me about Sarah,” you continue, “Because I– I don’t exactly have a good track record with the whole ‘family’ thing. And I don’t… I don’t really know anything about being a… maternal figure.”

You can’t say “mom”. Can’t think it.

It takes a moment of stunned silence for Joel to reply, but when he does, he lays a hand on your shoulder, “Baby, I… I wasn’t askin’ for you to jump into being a mother. I wasn’t… I wasn’t even asking you to be a mother at all. I just wanted you to know my priorities, because if this relationship is gonna continue, you have to have a relationship with my daughter.”

“I know.”

“But, I understand now. Thank you for tellin’ me about your mom.”

You sigh, closing your eyes and leaning your head back on the bench, “Thank you for listening and being patient with me.”

You can feel him looking at you, hear the smile in his words. “I’d wait forever for you, sugar.”

Your cheeks heat up, eyes wide open, and turn to him. The look in his irises tells you that he’s being completely genuine.

“Anyways, I gotta go. I’m not tryin’ to get away from you or this conversation, but my momma has to get home.”

You nod your acknowledgement, standing up. He holds a hand out for you to take and you pull him up from the bench, but you don’t let go– you guide him towards the exit of the park and then he takes the reins from there, leading you in the direction of his apartment.

“Your mom watch her when you’re at work?”

“Yeah, Tommy does too sometimes when he’s not gettin’ his ass beat in alleyways after school,” he rolls his eyes. 

You huff out a breath of amusement, “Well, that’s very kind of them.”

You squeeze his hand. It’s calloused from hard work and dry from the hot Texas weather. His larger fingers engulf yours.

“Tell me about her.”

He starts to shake his head, “Oh, we don’t–”

“No, no, I want to know about her.”

He’ll always take an opportunity to brag about his baby girl.

In the few minutes walk, he tells you about Sarah. How she turns five in July. How she smiles with her teeth, showing off her two front teeth that they just pulled. How he very unsuccessfully pulled a Tooth Fairy heist, which resulted in him having to admit to his daughter that the Tooth Fairy wasn’t real. How she looks just like her mom, but is just so beautifully unique in her own way. How her hair never cooperates with him, so he has to take her to the salon down the street so they can braid her hair. How she likes pink the most and requests the same pink butterfly hair clips every morning despite the large collection of hair accessories she’s amassed. How he loves her with everything in him.

You arrive at your destination, or at least you think so, as you approach a small bakery and Joel takes out his key.

“I rent the apartment above the bakery from the owner. She has a house with kids and a husband so she doesn’t need to stay here, and she’s an old family friend, so she lets Sarah and I stay up here for fairly cheap.”

You smile, “That’s very kind.”

“Yes, but she loves to come visit way more than she’s actually welcomed. She likes Sarah a lot, I mean, most people do because she’s a great kid, but y’know…”

He suddenly perks up, holding his hands up in a “stop” motion.

“Wait– stay here.”

You watch him run up the stairs two at a time, before the door closes behind him. You stay in your spot.

He comes back down the stairs with his seashell in his hand– the gray one with the brown stripes, the one he had so proudly presented to you two days ago on the beach. The one he told you was simple, didn’t need to be flashy to get the job done. The one that was so obviously him that it hurt to think about the last couple of days of avoiding him, of the time wasted.

You cradle it in your palms and look up at him through your eyelashes.

“I’m sorry,” you mutter.

“For what, sugar?”

“For making you think I didn’t want you.”

He sighs, grabbing your wrists and pulling you into his chest, wrapping his arms around your shoulders.

“Don’t be sorry– wasn’t your fault. I got lots of things to work on, and so do you. We jus’ need to communicate better, like you said.”

You nuzzle your head into his chest. He smells like leather and freshly-cut wood.

He feels like home.

“Yeah, we do.”

✦ ✦ ✦

December 1994

It’s the middle of December when your 21st birthday rolls around.

Elaine throws a party in the basement of your dorm building, approved by your RA as a “floor event” for the end of the semester (which in a way isn’t a lie because most of your dorm floor is there anyways) the day before your birthday. You had convinced Joel to come too, all of your friends swooning over him and winking at you when you introduced them to him. He’s blushing the entire night.

But on your actual birthday, Joel takes you to his apartment for the first time, dropping Sarah off at his mom’s house for the night.

When you first walked in, you think that even if you hadn’t known this was Joel’s apartment, that you could’ve easily picked it out in a lineup. The ceilings are vaulted, popcorn textured walls that are painted an off-white that makes the space look larger than it is, a kitchen off to the right and a bedroom door straight ahead. There’s a painting of horses that Joel has described to you before above the mantle in the living room, it was his dad’s. You can tell he’s cleaned up, because all of the pink toys that he told you were usually scattered all over the floor for him to stub his toe on, which he did constantly, are neatly piled in a basket in the corner of the room. The couch is old, sagging in the middle, but it looks comfortable because of all of the quilts thrown all over the back.

After a dinner of your favorite food, which Joel painstakingly made to perfection, he guides you to the living room couch and hands you a present.

It’s a big cardboard box with a purple bow stuck on top. Before you can even think about opening it, he takes the bow off and puts it on top of your head.

“It’s for your birthday and Christmas ‘cause it’s a pretty expensive gift, and y’know I don’t make a whole lot at the diner, but I think it was worth it.”

You open the box with a smile and what sits waiting for you is a pair of cowboy boots. And they are beautiful.

They’re made of a thick leather that feels smooth beneath your fingers as you pick them up and cradle one of them in your hands. It’s heavy in your grip, sturdy and obviously well-made– stitches tight and leather buffed. The sides are a light purple with white sprigs of lavender stitched into the leather.

“They’re work boots, so they're steel-toed and waterproof. I treated the leather already, but you can bring ‘em to me every couple months and I’ll do it again. Figure that you needed shoes that weren’t your half-destroyed Converse and I love my boots, so I thought, you know, maybe you’d like a pair too,” he chuckles stiffly, carding a hand through his hair.

You’re speechless, to the point that you can’t even point out that he had implied a future two months from now where you’re still dating. There’s about a hundred words you want to say to him, but none of them seem good enough.

Gently placing the boot back in the box and on the floor, you stand up and move in front of Joel and in-between his thighs. He’s looking up at you with wide eyes and you want to devour him whole.

“What’re you doin’, sugar?”

You climb into his lap and smirk down at him, “Lookin’ at ya.”

He grabs the outsides of your thighs and squeezes them, “Oh, really?”

“Yup,” you pop the ‘p’ with a smirk, throwing your arms around his neck. Pushing yourself further into his lap, your nose brushes against his.

If someone asked you what your favorite thing about Joel was, you would tell them that it’s his eyes. Those defined crows feet that kiss the corners of his gorgeous honey-brown irises are enchanting– evidence of a life, so far, well-lived.

You adore him. You–

“I love you.”

He pulls back slightly with wide eyes.

“I– sugar, you don’t have to say it if you’re not ready.”

That’s so like Joel– to think he doesn’t deserve this.

You weave your fingers into the curls that stick to the back of his neck and your smirk turns into a smile, “I’m ready and I love you.”

You nudge his nose with your own and lean in, lips connecting in a simple peck.

“I love you too– so much, sugar,” he whispers, pressing your lips together again.

“Thank you for the boots, Joel. They’re beautiful.”

“I hope it’s okay– gettin’ you one gift. I… you know I’m not exactly the richest person in the world.”

“Oh baby, is that why you’ve been picking up all those extra shifts with Tommy?”

“Yeah,” he draws out bashfully.

You kiss him again, “Miller, it is more than okay for you to give me one gift. In fact, it would’ve been okay if you hadn’t gotten me anything. Just you being here is enough for me.”

“Oh, really?”

He sighs, squeezing your thighs again, pulling you in closer until your chests touch. You can feel him beneath you. Your cheeks heat up.

“Mhm.”

It’s gentle, the way he lays you down on the bed, legs hanging off the edge. He stands between your shaking legs. Your body is buzzing with the electricity of the moment, as he looks down at you with hooded, black eyes– hungry and soft.

He takes his time kissing up your body, starting where your skin is exposed at the top of your pajama pants and making his way up, up, up, in between your heaving, clothed breasts, shirt long gone on the living room floor, and finally up to your lips. He pecks them once and sighs, arms bracketing your head.

He says your name sternly, “Are you sure you want to do this? Because you know, I am very okay with waitin’.”

You look up into those eyes, the ones you fell in love with first, and you know. You know this is what you need.

“Please,” you whine, hips stuttering under his.

He holds your hip down with his large, sturdy hand and speaks softly, “Baby, I need a yes or no.”

“Yes, yes! I’m ready, Joel, please.” 

With all the energy you have left in your buzzing and needy limbs, you wrap your arms around his neck and pull him into a kiss that says all the shit that’s always left unsaid. You’re my other half, I don’t think I can live without you anymore, I am yours, You are mine.

And it’s gentle, because that’s who Joel is. A father, a caregiver, a lover– he is gentle. He takes care of you, loving you down to the tips of your fingers, taking his time to savor the taste of you. It’s not perfect– there’s both of your awkward giggles while Joel pulls the condom on and your hisses as he goes a little too fast– but, to you, it’s perfect in all the ways it matters and you’re seeing stars multiple times before Joel finally finishes with a loud and gorgeous moan.

After Joel wipes you both down with a warm washcloth, you’re laying in his arms, playing with the wispy, brown hair just below his cheekbones and he’s humming in delight like a cat purrs.

“I love you,” he whispers, eyes closed.

“I love you, too,” you whisper back, kissing his chest just above his heart where you wish you could burrow yourself forever. Moving out of this bed is tomorrow’s problem. Today, you can pretend that you’re nestled in his heart chambers as his breaths slow and he falls asleep with his arms wrapped around you in a tight embrace, like even in his sleep he has to keep you close enough to feel your breaths, make sure you’re still next to him.

✦ ✦ ✦

March 1995

It’s not until three months later that Joel agrees that it’s time for you to meet Sarah. You’re not sure why it takes him so long to make that decision, but you try not to think about it too much or else you start to panic and you promised Joel that you would trust him more and this is one of those moments where you just need to tell your brain to ‘shut up’ and trust him. So, you trust him.

It’s a Friday evening. You pick him up from the diner and walk the short trip with your hands intertwined. You can feel the sweat pooling on his palms, despite the cool spring weather, but you don’t let go.

You’ve been to his apartment before, many times in fact, but it’s so different when it’s not just the two of you. Walking into high-pitched giggles and the low groan of the old stand mixer that usually sits dormant on Joel’s counter is odd, but it feels right– like this is how it’s always supposed to be.

Your heart is racing. He pulls you into the apartment and you see her for the first time.

Her light brown curls bounce, confined near her temples by the two butterfly clips in them, as she jumps up and down in her sparkly pink, plastic, princess heels that clack obnoxiously on the tiled floor of the kitchen. She’s wearing a pink, long-sleeved shirt– the red top of Elmo’s head just barely peeking out of the top of her jean overalls. Her tawny-brown, chubby cheeks are pulled taught by her unending smile. She looks just like the numerous pictures Joel has shown you with pride in his eyes, but now, in front of you, she is real.

And it doesn’t scare you. It excites you.

“Papi, is that you,” you hear a graveled, feminine voice cut through the static-filled radio that’s attached to the underside of the cabinet.

And now you’re scared.

Not only is Joel’s little girl in front of you, but so is his mother. Her dark brown hair, already graying at the roots despite her young age of forty-five, is pulled into a braid that runs all the way down to her lower back. She has a blue dress on with intricate white floral designs on the skirt, long and flowing. It moves gracefully as she glides around the kitchen. In a weird way, it is so obvious that Joel is her son.

Sarah’s eyes light up when she spots her dad, hands flying over her head.

“Daddy!”

Joel’s nervous demeanor is quickly discarded, leaving a smile in its wake.

“Guppy!”

She runs to her father, heels clacking and hair bouncing, and slams into his calves. Wrapping her arms around his legs, she squeezes with a grunt. All Joel does is chuckle at her violent affection.

From her position attached to her father’s legs, she turns her head towards you with her eyebrows crossed and a frown on her face, “Who’s that, Daddy?”

You sit on your calves to get down to her level and tell her your name with a smile, “It’s really nice to meet you.”

You’re good with kids. It’s why you wanted to be a teacher in the first place, besides the joy you got from sharing your knowledge. You used to babysit for your neighbors constantly (which was a good way to make money, but also an excuse to leave the house when your dad was having one of his really bad days). So, you should be good with Sarah. Right?

Joel nudges her off of him and kneels down to her level as well, “She’s my girlfriend.”

He doesn’t beat around the bush, doesn’t talk around it, because his little girl is smart and he wants to tell her the truth.

She looks you up and down suspiciously with her big brown eyes, “Girlfriend?”

“Yeah, baby. She’s my friend that I kiss sometimes.”

Her face scrunches up in disgust, “Ew!”

You copy her expression and whisper, “It is kinda gross sometimes.”

She looks you up and down with her eyebrows furrowed. For a second, you think she might be offended by you calling her father gross; based on what Joel has told you about her, you thought she would appreciate a joke at her dad’s expense, but maybe she didn’t when it came from someone she didn’t know–

Her face lights up and she starts to giggle, hands pulling at her father’s shirt.

“You’re gross, Daddy.”

He looks down at his clothes, covered in grease and sweat and laughs, “I guess I am.”

“I wonder how I can get clean,” he draws out, tapping his chin as if in deep thought. He scoops her up into his arms and starts to rub his face and hair, covered in grime from a long shift at the diner, all over her overalls.

She screeches, her laugh boiling over and filling the little living room. Her smile is radiant.

“Daddy, put me down!” She pushes at his shoulders with her tiny hands, which, of course, doesn’t move Joel an inch, but she continues pushing as hard as she can.

“But, you said I was gross! I’m just trying to fix it!”

“You’re makin’ me gross!”

“What?!”

She looks desperately over at you, grin taking over her chubby face, and reaches for you with the arm that isn’t restrained by Joel, “Help!”

“I’ll help you!” You stand up, grab her arm, and pull lightly, making sure not to hurt her.

“He’s too strong,” you cry out dramatically.

Her voice bounces as Joel jostles her around, “Ask him to stop! Politely!”

She adds “politely”, as if she’s repeating a mantra she’s held close to her heart. It’s endearing and it makes your heart ache for the kindness that Joel has taught and shown his daughter.

You oblige her. “Gross man, can you please let go of the princess?”

He stops suddenly, placing her down on the ground with a stomp of her feet. She prances away from him and over to you, hiding behind your legs.

“Anything for the Queen,” he salutes to you and looks at Sarah with sympathy in his eyes, “I’m sorry, Princess. I thought that you wanted me to get clean.”

She giggles again, wiping her hands down the bib of her overalls, “Daddy, you have to get clean in the shower!”

He throws his hands up in the air, “The shower?! Why didn’t you just say that?”

She copies her dad, throwing her hands up in the air, laughing still.

Turning to you, she curtsies, emulating lifting a skirt with her hands, “Thank you, kind lady for saving me. I’ll ‘emem- ‘emember this.”

She struggles with the word ‘remember’, nose scrunching as she knows she isn’t saying it right, but can’t quite get the syllables around her tongue.

“Anything for the Princess,” you curtsy back at her with your real dress.

Silent up to this point, Joel’s mom finally decides to put her two cents in.

“I like your boots, mija.”

You look down at your feet and see those gorgeous cowboy boots with the embroidered lavender sprigs and the lavender leather on the sides and you’re reminded how much Joel loves you– that this is a moment to celebrate, not to ruin with your overthinking. Joel adores his mother and Sarah– it is a privilege to meet these people.

“Oh, thank you, Mrs. Miller! Joel got them for me for my birthday.”

She smirks and winks at you, “I know, I helped him pick them out.”

She throws a towel over her shoulder and pops a tray in the oven. Joel and Sarah are talking behind you in soft voices. You can’t really make out what they’re saying, but you don’t really mind. Whatever made Sarah the most comfortable in this situation is good with you.

“Well, they’re beautiful. Thank you for helping him.”

Shutting the oven door with her hip, she pulls another tray from the counter and places it on top of the stove. She does all of this while making direct eye contact with you, like she is so familiar with the space that she could move around it with her eyes closed.

“I help papi with whatever he needs and he doesn’t know the first thing about what a girl likes– that’s why I buy all of Sarah’s clothes… and don’t call me Mrs. Miller– makes me feel older than I am. Call me Essie.”

Your face heats up, “Okay, Essie.”

“Momma–”

“You–” she points at Joel, stern look on her face– “are late.”

Joel looks so guilty, you almost think he’s killed someone. “I’m sorry, Momma. Don kept me later than usual.”

“Only reason I’m mad is that you took my time away from meeting your beautiful girl.” She walks up to you and hugs you.

Oh.

You stiffen, not because the hug is unwelcome, it is very welcome, but because you can’t remember the last time you’d been hugged by anyone but Elaine and Joel– by a mother.

And you can feel all the softness of a mother that you never got to have pour through her and to you. You know she knows about what happened to your mom; Joel tells his momma everything, but you hadn’t expected her to be this kind to you. Because you’re you, of course you had expected the worst, that she would hate you, tell you to get away from her son, tell you that you weren’t good enough, but here she is, showing you all the gentleness that she had taught her son to show others. You relax into it.

An embrace can say a thousand words, and you think this one says a thousand and one.

You can feel the heat on your face climbing further down and into your chest, straight to your heart.

“Sorry, Momma,” he mumbles.

She lets go of you and you feel the loss of her. You hope that she’ll show you her kindness again– you crave that affection.

“It’s okay–” she grabs your face and puts her forehead to yours– “You’re here now.”

Her dress swishes behind her as she returns to the kitchen to continue her cooking.

“Thomas is coming over,” she yells, her voice cracking slightly at the end with the effort.

Joel’s eyes go wide, “What?”

Sarah screeches, jumping up and down, which just seems to be her blanket response to excitement, “Uncle Tommy!”

Essie laughs, her whole face lighting up with the force of it, “Your brother wanted to meet your girl.”

You’ve heard lots of things about Tommy from Joel: how he gets regularly arrested for starting fights with people, how determined and head strong he was, how much he loved Sarah, and how massive of a flirt he was. At 17-years-old, Joel’s younger brother was a huge pain in his ass, but he loved him regardless.

“So he invited himself?”

She shakes her head, “No, toro, I invited him when I told him my plans for today before he went to school.”

“But–”

A knock on the door interrupts his protest. There’s the jingle of a key and then the door slams open with a kick.

“Hello, brother!”

Joel’s face falls into a blank stare, “Hello.”

Sarah, ever the aggressive greeter, runs to her uncle with a scream, “Tom-Tom!”

“Sarah,” he yells as he picks her up and spins her around in his arms. Her screeches turn into rambunctious laughter.

Tommy is a handsome young man. He has the same unruly brown curls that Joel does, but his are more structured and lay more securely on the top of his head, unlike Joel’s where it cascades down to his neck. Big, brown eyes and strong, dark eyebrows make him look more innocent than he actually is. He’s got a flannel and a stained wife-beater on.

“Nene, I told you to dress nicely,” Essie yells, leaning out on the entryway to the kitchen.

Tommy’s confident look quickly fades from his face, the same guilty look his brother had just sported taking over, “I’m sorry, Momma.”

She hums and goes back to the kitchen.

“Shit,” tumbles out of Tommy’s mouth.

“Sh–” Sarah starts to repeat, before Tommy claps a hand over her mouth. You can hear her giggling from behind his hand.

“Tommy!”

“Sorry, man, I didn’t mean to– ack, gross,” he exclaims as Sarah licks his palm.

He deposits her onto the ground and she runs into the kitchen, screaming. He rubs his hand on his dirty jeans.

“Tommy. This is my girlfriend,” he sighs, telling him your name, which Tommy repeats as he takes your hand in his (not the one that was just licked by Sarah) and kisses your hand.

“Well, seems you already know my name, sweetheart. It’s a pleasure to meet you after all these months of Joel talkin’ ‘bout ya.”

What you wouldn’t give to be a fly-on-the-wall when Joel talked about you. You knew he’d never speak badly of you– he never spoke badly of anyone, including Tommy–, but you were curious what he could possibly be saying to them, especially the young man in front of you.

“It’s nice to meet you too, Tommy.”

He drops your hand lightly and looks over at his brother. You think you see him wink, but you’re choosing to ignore whatever you just saw. You do, however, see the blush crawling back up Joel’s neck, as you turn back to him.

Joel takes your hand in his. You lace your fingers through his and squeeze lightly, an acknowledgement of his social awkwardness.

“Well, I’m gonna go see if I can help Momma with dinner, see if she can forgive me for dressin’ like an idiot.”

Joel’s lips form a line, “See ya.”

“Oh, brother, you’ve outdone yourself. Don’t know how you managed it.” He points to you, turns on his heel, and walks to the other room.

“I’m sorry about him,” Joel mutters, eyes downcast to the floor.

You shrug, “It’s okay. He seems nice.”

Guiding your shoulder towards him so that you’re fully facing him, he kisses your forehead, “Tell me if this is all too much, okay? Meetin’ my whole immediate family at once is a lot.”

You shake your head, “Joel, I am honored that I get to meet them. It’s a little overwhelming, but I can handle myself– don’t worry about me.”

“Okay, sugar,” he sighs into your hair.

The rest of the night goes off without a hitch. Sarah spends the whole meal screeching and throwing food at her dad. Tommy spends the whole meal laughing at Sarah throwing food at her dad. Joel patiently reminds Sarah that she’s not supposed to throw food, which, of course, she doesn’t listen to and continues to throw food at her dad. And you and Essie are in your own little world, discussing everything from your schooling to how she grew up in Columbia, but met Joel’s father when she moved to the States in 1970. She is an amazing listener and an engaging storyteller, face clearly displaying her emotions as she tells you about her brilliant life so far.

Joel tells you on your walk back to your dorm that he’s pretty sure that his mom likes you more than him now. You joke that you like her better than him too. He groans, “My momma’s gonna take my girl from me.”

“Your girl?”

“Yeah, sugar, my girl.”

✦ ✦ ✦

April 1995

“Are you ever gonna hang out with me again,” Elaine whines, watching you pull a flannel out of your closet and stuff it in your bookbag next to your books that you’re bringing to study with. It was Joel’s, but it was starting to lose his scent and you were going to demand he wear it tonight so that the leather smell would seep back into the fabric.

“Lane, we hang out all the time.”

Hair fanned out below her in a halo of sorts, Elaine lays on her bed with her head off the side, feet in the air. She scoffs and throws her hands up in exasperation.

“No! That’s not true! You are never here on the weekends anymore and that’s when all the good parties are going on.”

You deadpan, “When have I ever gone to parties with you?”

“You went to some parties!”

“I went to one party and left an hour in because I got completely overwhelmed and started crying after one drink.”

“Okay… but that was freshman year and I bet you could hold your booze much better now that you’re legal.”

“Elaine, baby, sweet girl, love of my life, I do not want to go to a party.”

She pouts and crosses her arms, “Yeah, you wanna go hang out with your boy and his four-year-old all weekend.”

You clear your throat and mutter, “Actually, Sarah is staying with her abuela this weekend.”

Elaine gasps, flipping around and sitting up on all fours, “No fucking way.”

“Yes fucking way,” you reply flatly.

“You are going to be in Joel’s apartment all weekend. Just the two of you.”

“Yup.”

“All by yourselves. For an entire weekend.”

“You just said the exact same thing twice and my answer is still yes.”

She bounds over to you and grabs your face in her hands, “Oh, my sweet baby, you are getting your brains fucked out all weekend, aren’t you?”

“Good god, Lane,” you shake her hands off her face and continue your packing.

She hops in place a couple times, her wild hair doing flips as she does, “You are, aren’t you?! Oh my god. This is so great, I cannot wait for you to tell me every detail when you get back.”

You glare at her for a moment and shake your head, “Fine.”

She shrieks, throwing her arms up in the air and running around your small shared room like she’s doing a victory lap.

Pumping a fist in the air, she flops backwards onto her bed and stares at the ceiling, face suddenly serious. But, you’re used to this by now, her mood changes like the wind– she has some of the most intense ADHD you’ve ever seen.

She raises her hand up.

You sigh, “Yes, Elaine?”

“I have a question.”

She sits up again, hands fidgeting in her lap, “What are you gonna do about Joel when you go back to Seattle for the summer?”

“I–” Oh.

You’d been thinking about summer break constantly since the moment you started dating Joel. It’s been a looming threat over everything you two have shared over the past 6 months, a near-constant reminder that you’ll be leaving to go back to your dad’s house in less than a month. You’d just pushed it to the back of your mind. No one ever mentioned it, so you just never brought it up.

But now that Elaine is here, sitting in front of you, confronting you with something you’ve been avoiding for months, it hits you like a ton of bricks.

“I don’t know.” You sink down into your desk chair, bag slapping on the tile at your feet.

“You really like him– don’t you, baby girl?”

You nod, staring at the floor. Two years of living in these dorms and you’d never noticed how uneven the tile was. You feel your heart beating in your ears.

“You know, you could stay with me and my parents this summer?”

“No, no, I don’t wanna bother them.”

She purses her lips, “Well… I kind of already asked them and they said that it was okay.”

You gasp, turning towards her, “What?”

“Yeah, baby, it’d be like a whole summer of sleepovers, except y’know, you’d have your own room.”

Elaine’s parents were cattle farmers. They owned a small ranch just outside of Austin with a wide expanse of land and multiple small houses throughout. Elaine didn’t live with her parents– she lived in her own small farmhouse about a quarter of a mile down the dirt road that ran through their property. You’d been there before; it was beautiful.

And not having to go back to Seattle: that would be great. If last summer was any indication of your dad’s excitement at you coming home, you had been dreading what this summer would bring.

But here’s an out. A way to avoid your father and his horrible rage. A way to stay near Joel and Sarah. A way to celebrate Sarah’s birthday with her in July like she’d been begging you to.

“Maybe.”

She grins, hands still fidgeting in her lap, but more aggressively like she’s trying to hold herself back from a big reaction to your “maybe”, which you both know just means “yes”.

“Thank you.”

“Don’ even mention it, baby. You’re the love of my life– I couldn’ bear another summer without you.”

Later that evening you're talking to Joel in his apartment over dinner, candles lit between you, Joel snug in your favorite flannel of his. You tell him about Elaine’s idea. He insists that you take her up on her offer. You send her a text that you’re going to stay. She replies with, “!!!” and then another text a few minutes later that reads, “go get sum, bb ;)”.

You make sure Joel can’t see that text.

When you’re done with dinner, you’re doing dishes together. He’s washing, you’re rinsing and drying. When you have dinner here, you switch who does what task– it keeps it fair, that’s what Joel had said when you started coming here a few months ago.

You can’t believe it’s been months with this amazing man. It makes you giddy: that time seems to pass so quickly with him.

He’s been quiet– well, more quiet than usual today. You think it might just be that he misses Sarah, but that theory quickly becomes dust when he finally starts to speak.

He clears his throat and breaks your comfortable silence.

“Talked to Tommy today.”

“Oh, yeah?”

He sniffs, “Yeah.”

“And what exactly did you two talk about?”

You know Joel and Tommy have never exactly gotten along. When you’d met Tommy the month before, that had been blatantly obvious. Joel loved Tommy. They both knew it– they’d never say it out loud though. But, their “talking” usually involved Tommy rambling about whatever he wanted and Joel grunting every other sentence so that he knew that he was still listening.

“He, uh– he says he’s gonna join the army.”

Your head whips towards him, “What?!”

He flattens his lips into a line and sniffs again, nodding.

“Was he fucking with you?”

That wasn’t an uncommon occurrence with Tommy. He regularly said things he knew would make Joel upset just to mess with him. Once, he had told Joel that his girlfriend at the time was pregnant just after his 17th birthday. Joel didn’t talk to him for a couple weeks after that.

He shakes his head, putting the sponge down into the lukewarm water.

Exasperated, you sigh, “Did he say why?”

“Says he wants to honor Dad or somethin’.”

You’d had discussions about Joel’s dad before. They were few and far-between, mostly because it was obvious that his father made him uncomfortable. He had died just six months after Sarah had been born– lung cancer caused by twenty-five years of smoking a pack a day, according to Joel.

Mark was a Vietnam veteran, left home at 18 to join the war effort. He’d met Essie when he was discharged with a prosthetic limb and a purple heart in 1970. Joel doesn’t know exactly what had happened to his dad in Vietnam, but he knew it was bad. He would wake up in the middle of the night to his dad screaming in his sleep– telling someone to move and then begging God to let his friend live.

Joel says he was terrified of his father, that he treated him like a “man” before he was old enough to have coherent conversations. What that meant was beyond you, but you understood that he wasn’t ready to talk about it and you were willing to wait. You would always wait.

“Do you– do you think he’s going to do it?”

He sighs, massaging his temples, “’M not sure. He… seemed pretty determined.”

Picking the sponge out of the water, he goes back to scrubbing, but now he’s doing it rougher, sponge squashed in his hand, dish squeaking aggressively. His eyebrows are scrunched together and you think you see a glint of something shiny in his eyes.

“Miller, what’s going on in that head of yours?”

He hands you the plate he was maiming to rinse and dry. You do so as he collects his thoughts.

Two more dishes are washed and dried before he says anything.

“Dad was a lot more gentle on Tommy than he ever was on me. He treated Tommy like his son, but he treated me like a soldier. Tommy had a dad, I had a General.”

He avoids eye contact with you as he continues.

“I think Tommy idolizes him too much, especially now that he’s gone and he never really saw the version of Dad that I did. The traumatized veteran.”

His shoulders shake as he sobs, choking on his words, “I don’t want Tommy to end up like Dad.”

Fuck, if that didn’t make you want to sob too. You hold yourself together for him, at least you try to. You can feel your emotions climbing up your throat, desperate to choke out of you.

You put a hand on his bicep and lean on his shoulder. The dirty water splashes when the sponge falls back into it, flicking water up and onto both of your shirts

A tear escapes his eye and lands on the top of your head, soaking into your hair. 

“Did you tell him that?”

Another sob claws out of his mouth, “Yeah. He wouldn’ listen.”

“Well, baby, you did all you could do. Seems like there’s no stopping him.”

He doesn’t say anything. His wet hand wraps around your forearm and pulls it around his back so that you’re hugging him. You squeeze your arms around his waist as he runs his fingers through your hair, clings on to the strands and guides your head to his neck. You can feel the dish water from his hands soaking into your scalp.

You press a kiss to the skin under your lips and he sighs, pulling you in even closer.

“Things will work out. Whatever happens, I’m always here.”

He nods his head into your shoulder. A high-pitched whine tumbles out of his lips involuntarily.

“It’ll be okay.”

Shit.

✦ ✦ ✦

July 1995

Friday, July 14th, 1995 marks Sarah’s fifth birthday. She invites all her friends from preschool and Joel invites everyone he knows would want to be there for his daughter. Joel told you that he had gone to text Tommy to invite him, forgetting that his brother had left for basic training a month ago. He sent him a text anyway– asking him how he was doing. He hadn’t gotten a response yet.

When you walked into the apartment, with the key that Joel had given you a month ago, to help Joel and Essie set up the party this morning, Sarah had stopped you at the door with a smirk on her face and something held behind her back.

“Hello, Queen Sugar!” She curtsies to you with her large puffy, pink dress that Essie had painstakingly spent the last month making her.

You curtsy back with your own dress, the purple sundress you had worn to the beach all those months ago, “Hello, Princess Sarah! May I come in?”

You really know she’s up to something when her smirk turns into a maniacal grin.

“No.”

Hm. Where the hell is Joel?

You get down on your knees so that you’re eye-level with her, “Why not, your highness?”

She finally pulls whatever is behind her back out and holds it out to you. It’s the silver plastic crown with the pink jewels that she had worn on her fourth birthday. The one she wears whenever she’s feeling particularly royal. It’d been slightly too big for her then, but it fit her like a glove now. 

“Because you aren’t wearing your crown yet. And you know it’s improper to attend a social event as the queen without your crown!”

Well, you didn’t know that. But you knew now. Joel’s doormat was really uncomfortable to kneel on.

“Well, of course, your highness, how could I forget that?”

She nods her head once resolutely.

“But I must ask, why aren’t you wearing a crown?”

She puts her hands on her hips, “I’ve decided that since it is your first Guppy birthday, your majesty, that you must wear the crown! It’s only fair that I share.”

Holding the crown out in front of her, she declares with determination, “All hail, Queen Sugar!”

You hear Essie’s graveled voice call through the apartment behind Sarah, “Mariposa, come help your abuela with decorating your cookies!”

She plops the crown on your head and runs into the apartment, leaving the door wide open. Well, so much for decorum.

“Hey, sugar.” A hand pops into your vision from the stairs beside you.

He’s got a couple bags of decorations in his left arm and is holding out the other for you to take.

“Hey,” you groan as he pulls you up onto your feet, “You want some help?”

“Nah, I got it.” He urges you inside with a wave of his hand and he walks in behind you.

The furniture that usually is cluttered around his living room is pushed to the walls, so that there’s more space for the kids to play. You notice a basket full of her toys sits in wait in the corner of the room, filled past the brim with pink.

“Lovin’ the crown, baby,” he smiles, setting the paper bags on the couch.

It’s crooked, askew from Sarah’s hasty exit.

“Thanks. Apparently I wasn’t allowed to attend a public event without one because it was ‘improper’.” You put quotes on the last words with your fingers.

“Well, if the princess says…” Coming around the side of the couch, he stands in front of you. You look up at him through your lashes as he adjusts the crown so it sits straight on your head. He’s done it enough with his little girl to know how to get it just right so the tight plastic doesn’t dig into your scalp.

“Thank you,” you whisper and press a chaste kiss to his lips.

He chuckles, snaking his arms around your waist, “Anything for the queen.”

You hum as he presses another kiss to your lips, longer this time, soft. You love these moments with Joel– the ones where he’s put himself in the moment, so that he isn’t thinking about the millions of things he needs to get done. But really, you love every moment you get to have with Joel.

“Daddy!” Sarah’s running into the living room with frosting smeared on her hands and all across her cheek and Joel puts himself to work getting it off her in the bathroom as you start to pull decorations out of the bags. Her birthday party this year is Sesame Street themed. When Joel had suggested it to her, she had jumped around the room screeching about all the decorations she needed and where to put them and how she needed to invite Elmo now so he would get his invitation on time. You had been in charge of the return letter from Elmo where he reluctantly declined her invitation with a crude drawing of himself in the bottom corner (Joel didn’t stop laughing at how horrible it looked for a week afterwards, “He looks like he got run over by a semi, baby.”). She wrote him back saying she understood and drew a heart and a smiley face at the bottom.

“Elaine’s gonna be late, she got held up with something.” You tell Joel as you hand him a freshly-blown balloon. He’d gotten the frosting off Sarah and then urged her into a nap so that she could be at full energy for her party.

He chuckles, “Oh, really? And what was that?”

Rolling your eyes, you sigh with a grin, “Robin.”

The mean blonde you had met in November in your dorm room after finding out about Sarah has been slowly worming her way into your heart. While you’ve been spending most of your summer with Joel, Elaine’s been spending most of her’s with Robin, who had stayed on campus this break to take summer classes. At first you’d been hesitant to encourage the relationship, Robin hadn’t made a very good impression, but Elaine seemed really happy, happier than you’d seen her in your entire friendship, and Robin’s grumpy attitude was growing on you.

“Good for her.”

“Yeah, good for her, but not so good for my sleep schedule.”

Turns out living in a house alone with Elaine all summer was great, except for the fact that the walls were a little too thin for your liking. You’d been learning a bit more about Elaine’s sex life than you wanted to know.

You watch as Joel attempts to wrap the string around the knot on the balloon with little success, his large fingers getting in the way of themselves.

“Gimme,” you mumble, holding your hand out.

He reluctantly hands the balloon and string over with a bashful smile.

Deftly, you string the balloon and watch it rise to the ceiling as you let it go. It wobbles back and forth and then finally stays in place.

“You could stay here tonight if you wanted? You’ve got those extra clothes you left in my drawer just in case.”

The drawer.

The drawer had been a very big deal to you when he first offered it casually one night when you’d realized you had forgotten to bring an outfit for the next day. 

“You already left a toothbrush here, just leave a couple outfits here too. I’ll clear a drawer for you.”

Joel was very confused when you had started to cry. Through heaving breaths and tears you had explained to him that you had never been given a drawer before.

It didn’t help that you were PMSing really bad that day (which had been the entire reason you had come over in the first place).

You give him a smile, “Yeah?”

“Yeah, baby.”

You know there won’t be any sex, Joel made it pretty clear the first time you had stayed here when Sarah was home that he was not comfortable with that while she was in the apartment. The wall's thinness didn’t leave anything to the imagination and her room was right next to his. That was okay though, you enjoyed sleeping on the heater that was Joel Miller and that was good enough for you.

“Okay.” You stand up and give him a kiss on the cheek.

He pats your ass as you walk towards the kitchen. You send him a glare back with a smirk.

Everyone starts arriving at four, except your best friend, and you watch as Joel tries his best to wrangle six toddlers to do the activities that he’d planned. He bought some coloring books and told the kids to bring their own crayons because he had thought that maybe that would be a calming activity, but as you had predicted two weeks ago when he told you his plan, it had quickly devolved into drawing on the fold out table and somehow finding markers and drawing on each other. You helped him toss the drawing stuff in his room when the kids were distracted by Sarah telling the story of how you had almost “improperly” walked into her birthday party without your crown on. The kids thought she was hilarious.

Sarah is instantly captivated when Elaine walks through the door, like everyone is when they first meet her.

“Your hair is so pretty,” Sarah squeals, balancing on the balls of her feet.

Elaine gasps, a smile lighting up her face as she hands you her bag to put in Joel’s room, “Oh my god, your hair is so pretty too, baby girl.”

“I’m Sarah Esperanza Miller.” She recites her full name with a smile on her face, proud of her name.

Elaine holds her hand out for her to take, “Hi, Sarah. I’m Elaine Jo MacKenzie.”

She perks up, her whole body suddenly standing at attention. “Wait here!”

Elaine grabs your elbow and pulls you into her body, giving you a light kiss on the cheek while you both watch Sarah run to her room across the house– weaving and dodging through the crowd. She peeks around your body to look at Joel, a dreamy grin on her face.

“She’s beautiful, Joel.”

He smiles, running a hand through his hair, “Thank you.”

She looks up at you, “You’re a lucky motherfucker.”

You laugh lightly, “I know.”

She adjusts the crown on your head.

“It’s crooked,” she explains, nodding when she determines that it’s perfect.

You nuzzle your nose into her hair; it smells like strawberries.

“Thank you.”

When Sarah comes back, she’s hiding something behind her back, an excited smile taking over her chubby cheeks.

She goes to Elaine, pulling her arm out of your own and down so she’s kneeling in front of her.

“Can I touch your hair?”

Joel sighs, “Baby, that’s not–”

Elaine doesn’t break eye contact with her as she answers her, “Of course, you can. Thank you for asking. That was really polite.”

Sarah looks up to her dad, silently asking him for permission and he nods his head.

“As long as she says ‘yes’, then it’s okay.”

Elaine nods too when she turns back to her and Sarah tucks Elaine’s puffy mess of hair behind her ear and sticks a small, pink butterfly clip just above her ear. Joel recognizes it as her favorite hair accessory, one of the only ones that Joel can easily style her hair with.

Elaine gasps, jumping up and finding the nearest mirror, and smiles when she sees herself in it. She delicately adjusts the clip so that it is more secure. “Oh, baby girl, I love it! Thank you!”

Sarah giggles uncontrollably, “I knew it would look pretty on you!”

“Well, of course, you knew– you’re a genius, baby!”

She kneels back on the ground and holds her arms out, an invitation for a hug. Sarah runs into her arms and she huffs with the force of her tiny body colliding with her chest.

You knew that Sarah would love Elaine; her eccentric joy was so magnetic that this automatic connection between the two of them just made sense. She had always made friends easily, but Elaine was an expert at entertaining children.

Sarah runs off to go play with her friends, so Elaine comes back up to take your arm again.

“Hey, we’re matching,” she points out, flicking the big jewel on the crown on your head.

“We are.”

Elaine’s eyes soften as she looks down at you, always taller than you when she actually straightened out her spine (which she so rarely did).

“Sarah’s girls.”

You nod.

Sarah’s girls.

series masterlist | masterlist of all masterlists 🌼 | eras masterlist 🌻

[moesnotifs]

mine | 2. we were sitting there by the water

pairing: young!no-outbreak!joel miller x f!reader

chapter summary: joel miller is falling in love and you’re learning to love, but joel’s hiding something big from you that might change everything, 

or the first and third date

chapter warnings: panic attack, implied parental abuse, joel is 22 and reader is 20, descriptions of a bad marriage and teenage pregnancy (Joel), reader is described a small amount (has hair, able-bodied, wears feminine clothing, is going to school for secondary english education, has a heavily-detailed background), joel being The Single Dad™, this author HATES sand but loves the idea of the beach, reader’s best friend being horny af, reader walking in on someone having barely-described sex, a thinly-veiled gilmore girls reference that probably no one but me will get, and an OC that the author is pretty sure is just chappell roan with a different name and a country accent

word count: 7.1k

a/n: i actually cannot thank y'all enough for all the love this series has gotten already. i am so excited to show y'all the story i have planned for these two (next chapter we'll get some sarah, and then it'll be three ;) ) . hope you like this chapter! any reblogs and notes are appreciated <3

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Do you remember, we were sittin' there by the water?

You put your arm around me for the first time

You made a rebel of a careless man's careful daughter

You are the best thing that's ever been mine

✦ ✦ ✦

October 1994

“I didn’t know you had it in ya. I’m impressed.”

You’re rifling through your closet, as your roommate rambles in her thick Texan accent from across the room. Joel’s supposed to be here in an hour. You had just gotten out of class and were desperately trying to pull yourself together before he got here. He had told you to dress nice– that he was taking you to dinner and you had left your dorm this morning thinking you had something to wear, but now that you’re standing in front of every piece of clothing you own, you’re not sure that any of it is good enough.

You groan, “Elaine, I will kill you. I won’t hesitate this time.”

“My baby girl is finally gonna get some,” she squeals, jumping on her bed and hopping onto the ground elegantly, her fiery red hair fanning around her perfectly like it always does. Even in her current outfit of a shirt she stole from some frat boy she fucked last week and pink boxer shorts, she was perfect.

“Elaine…”

She prances over to you, hands on her hips, mischief in her eyes. You go back to looking in your closet.

“I need more information,” she pauses, looking you up and down, “What do we think he’s packin’?”

You groan again, digging the heels of your palms into your eyes, “This is exactly why I didn’t tell you about this. I’m going to move out. I am requesting a roommate change.”

She guides your hands away from your face and giggles, “I’m sorry. This is just very important to me. I need to know everythin’.”

“There’s not much to know. We only talked for like half an hour,” you sigh. You pull a white dress and a denim vest from their hangers and toss them on your bed. Good enough.

She throws her hands up into the air when you walk away from her. “Okay, well, at least tell me what he looks like?”

You strip down to your underwear and pull the dress over your head. “Well… he’s tall, muscular. Curly brown hair, brown eyes– pretty, the kind that crinkle when he smiles… God, even his nose was pretty– strong–” you button your vest tightly to your chest, it’s almost like a corset– “I don’t think I’ve seen a prettier man in my life.”

“So… packin’?” She smirks.

You blush, throwing your hands up in the air, “Yeah, probably!”

She squeals, clapping her hands together. The sound almost makes you smile, but you smother it behind a groan.

“Oh my god. I’m so done with this. Tell me if this outfit is cute.”

She walks over to you and grabs your shoulders, face and voice genuine as she whispers, “Oh, baby… You are so beautiful. If Joel doesn't want you, then I might give you a go.”

“Well, let’s hope Joel wants me then.”

Elaine gasps and runs to her bed, grabbing the nearest pillow. You brace for impact as she throws it towards you with a giggle. Hello Kitty flies right into your face and plops to the ground as you squeal.

She pauses her laughter, her expression becoming serious as she stares at you.

“Why do you look like you’re going to puke?”

You glare at her and duck into your closet again for a pair of shoes, “Shut up.”

Docs will do, you think.

“No, seriously. Two seconds ago you made it sound like he was the man you were going to spend the rest of your life with and now you look green. What’s wrong with you?”

You sit in your desk chair and pull your boots on, avoiding eye contact with your persistent best friend when you answer her question.

“Because I’ve spent the past twenty years of my life avoiding being in a relationship at all costs and this guy's nice and handsome and funny and I just don’t want to let him down… y’know?”

Elaine says your name sternly, “You could never let anyone down. You are amazing and way too good for literally any man on earth, but from what you’ve told me, he seems like he might be decent enough.”

She pauses, walking over to you and putting her hands on your shoulders, “You need to get out there. If you never try, you’re gonna be lonely for the rest of your life and as much as I want to try to save you from that– you need to do that all on your own, baby.”

You take a deep breath, or as much of a deep breath as your vest will let you, and let it out, “I know. I just don’t… I don’t want to waste my time on something that probably won’t last.”

Her facial expression drops into annoyance, “You have no idea! You have no idea if this could last. You think that every relationship is doomed to fail, and that’s just not fair! At least give the guy a chance to prove it could work out.”

You pause to think over her words. He’s cute. This could just be some fun, even if it doesn’t last. You toss your thoughts back and forth before you give in.

“Okay. But if this doesn’t work out, we’re going to reflect back on this moment and I’ll get to say, ‘I told you so��� over and over until we die.”

She points a finger at you. “You are pathetic.”

“And so are you.” You stick your tongue out at her and she does the same to you.

A knock at your door alerts you to his presence.

Elaine squeals, jumping up and down, her hair flying everywhere.

You shush her and walk to the door, opening it.

His brown curls are somewhat contained by some gel he obviously doesn’t know how to use and he’s freshly shaven his face. He’s wearing blue jeans and a white dress shirt tucked neatly into a belt that makes his waist look heavenly. He’s wearing the same cowboy boots he wore last time you saw him. He looks beautiful.

Elaine is poking your back and giggling in your ear. You would be giggling too if you didn’t think it would make you look like a weirdo.

He pulls a bundle of white and purple from behind his back and thrusts it into your hands, like they’re going to burn him if he keeps holding onto them. Flowers– carnations and lavender with a hint of baby’s breath.

You chuckle at his insistence and take them from him, “Wow, Joel, they’re beautiful. Thank you.”

“Yeah, 's no problem. Figured you like purple so,” he trails off, stuffing his hands in his pocket. He smiles bashfully, cheeks a burning red. The fluorescent lighting of your dorm hall makes the blush on his face look much darker than it already is. 

You know your face is flushed too.

“Uh, come on in! I’ll find a vase for these and we can go.”

“Okay,” he mumbles, following behind you as you push Elaine to her bed and rustle through your closet for the one vase you keep. You can feel Joel’s eyes on you as you bend down.

Elaine clears her throat impatiently.

You hum and narrow your eyes at her from your hunched over position, “That’s Elaine. Don’t worry about her.”

But, of course, since Joel is a Southern Gentleman and Elaine is a lady he’s never met, he introduces himself.

And it opens the floodgates.

She asks him about his job and his apartment and what size pants he wears and if he’s dated a lot. And, of course, he answers each question patiently, even the pants one (he's a 32, Elaine’s winking at you from across the room).

She’s still talking even as you shut the door in her face and Joel asks if that’s rude and you reply, “Just ignore her. She likes it,”

You can hear her cackling from the other side of the door.

The night goes brilliantly. When you get to his car parked across the street, he holds the door open for you and lets you pick the music station, even though you can tell he’s not exactly comfortable with your selection of pop– he doesn’t say anything though.

He takes you to a Colombian restaurant downtown where everyone knows him and greets him with loud declarations of, “It’s been too long, cariño,” and “you never come here enough, pendejo,” which he waves off with a, “I need a break from you all, sometimes.”

He orders you some empanadas (he insists that the woman who cooks them here is an empanada genius) and himself lechona, which gets him a side eye from the server and he just brushes him off.

You ask him what is wrong with the lechona, and he says that it’s supposed to be for breakfast or lunch, but he likes the rice dish for dinner instead. You smile when the server comes back with your food and flicks Joel on the head.

You talk about school and your favorite books and Joel talks about the diner’s latest gossip (Mr. Cassini and Doreen went on a date the other day, he hears it went well) and his brother who he just bailed out of jail this morning. You ask him why he was busted and he just shrugs and says, “Didn’t ask. All he said was he didn’t want mom to know, so I didn’t tell her.”

You listen to Joel talk about his brother and his “mama” like they hung the sun and the moon in the sky. He avoids talking about his father, you don’t ask.

He asks you about your family and all you can manage to say after a moment to think it over is, “Dad lives back in Washington. I don’t really talk to him much.”

He doesn’t ask anything else about your family after that.

When the server comes over with the check, you go to get your purse out and Joel clicks his tongue, “No, sugar, I got this.”

“But–”

“Put the purse down.”

You put your purse down.

He takes you back to your dorm with a blinding smile on his face, eyes crinkling with the intensity of it, and he walks you all the way back up to your door, even after you insist you can get there yourself.

He leaves you with a kiss on the cheek and a wink, “Bye, sugar.”

“Goodbye, Joel Miller.”

The smile doesn’t leave your face for days, which just makes Elaine smug– “I told ya so,” leaving her lips every time she catches you daydreaming.

You think maybe… maybe this could work.

✦ ✦ ✦

November 1994

“Get in the car, Sugar,” he yells from across the street, his blue pick-up rumbling way too loudly like it always does. He’s got his window down and a Johnny Cash song playing on the radio.

It’s a sunny day, beautiful for a day at the beach like Joel has been planning and waiting for for a couple weeks now. It’s in the low 70s and the air is still. It’s perfect. He’s perfect.

You giggle, “I’m coming; calm down!”

Your lilac sundress swishes between your legs as you run across the street and to the truck, looking both ways before you cross the street.

Leaning against his car door and into the window, he turns his cheek to you and you lean forward to kiss it. He hums in delight. 

His eyes are sparkling a bright honey brown in the sunlight when he looks you up and down. He swirls his finger around and you give in with a smile, spinning for him, the skirt of your dress swirling around you in a silken circle and flip flops smacking the ground almost comically.

“Darlin’, you look gorgeous.” His grin is unmatched in its brilliance.

You resume your position on the door, arms crossed, and smirk, “Oh, really? How gorgeous?”

He hums, his own smirk lighting up his face, “Hm, get in the truck and you might find out.”

You perk up, “Oo, are you gonna buy me a pony?”

“It might be better than that, baby,” he laughs.

You gasp, grabbing his face in both your hands, for nothing except the drama of it all, “What could possibly be better than a pony?”

“Sugar, get in the damn car before I drive away,” he deadpans, but you can see his smile fighting to see the light of day.

“Okay, okay,” you giggle again. You never seem to stop giggling when he’s around.

This is your third date with Joel. The second had gone just as well as the first– you went to see a movie, Forrest Gump. You cried like a baby into Joel’s flannel and he just squeezed your shoulder reassuringly, trying his best to comfort you while the other theater-goers looked at you like you were crazy. He glared at every one of them until they looked away from you.

The night ended with another kiss on the cheek, from you this time, not Joel as it was the time before. You wanted to kiss him for real, know what his chapped lips would feel like on yours, but you were too nervous that you would fuck it up, so you just resorted to what you knew would work.

But, you think tonight might end how you want it to.

You’d seen him since then, going to the diner a few times to study between your dates and waiting up for him until his shift was over so he could walk you home. You offered once jokingly to walk him home, but he had answered with a very serious and stern no. You didn’t ask him again after that.

When you’re on the road, the sweet tea Joel had picked up from the diner for you (“Extra sweet, just how you like it, baby”) in your possession, and the highway rushing past you, you slouch in your seat and sigh, “Music?”

This is the only point of contention between the two of you. Joel liked classic country and rock, you did sometimes too, but you preferred pop music. He knew that.

He chuckles, like he knows you’re dreading the country that you know he’s going to play, but instead he says, “I got something for you, baby.”

He reaches around your front to open the glove box and two CDs sit within the truck's papers.

You gasp, snatching them up and clutching them to your chest, “No way!”

He glances at you and then back to the road, grin broad and sparkling in the sunlight, “Yes way.”

“You got me Like a Prayer and Music Box!” You unbuckle your seatbelt and throw your arms around his shoulders.

You can tell he’s proud of himself as you tuck Madonna into his CD player and hit play. His grin stays on his face as he watches you sing along; you even hear him humming along to the choruses of a few songs he recognizes from the radio.

It’s a three and a half hour long drive to the nearest beach– you curse Texas for being so damn long. But it’s also nice, watching Joel drive you, one hand on the steering wheel and the other holding onto your thigh where your dress doesn’t cover it. He traces circles and random shapes into your skin, eyes fixed on the road. At some point you grab his hand in both of yours and kiss his knuckles gently, before depositing it back where it belongs. He just squeezes your thigh in response.

You’re done with your tea within the first hour of the drive, which means you have to stop to pee by the second hour of the drive, so Joel stops for you in a small town off the highway and stands outside the bathroom in his short-sleeve button-up and khaki shorts (not at all intimidating if anyone asked you, he looked like a middle-aged dad on vacation) while he waits for you after he sees the cashier give you a look. You tell him he can wait in the car, that you’ll be fine, but he insists.

By the time you get to the beach, it’s around noon, so the sun is high in the sky as it shines down on you in a comforting hug of warmth. Joel, as he always does, runs to your side of the truck and opens your door for you. You give him a smile over your shoulder when he closes the door as well.

When you look out to the view in front of you, the breath knocks out of your lungs. You’ve never been to the beach in the South. You’d only gone to the beach once as a kid when your dad was having a good day. In Washington, the beaches were surrounded by bluffs of rock and the water was so cold you couldn’t really swim in them, but it was nice to stick your toes in the wet sand and go shell hunting. That’s one of the only memories that you have of your dad where he isn’t angry, where he smiles.

But the water rolling out in front of you is the bluest blue you’ve ever seen. It’s mesmerizing, watching the waves crash into the shore and each other. Seagulls squawk above you, demanding attention from the people below. The sun watches on in fascination at the beauty of the planet it warms.

The truck door slams behind you and Joel taps your back lightly, urging you forward. He has a small cooler and a couple towels thrown over his shoulder, one blue and the other purple. His free hand takes yours when you start to walk towards the shore.

He lays out the towels next to each other, overlapping slightly in the middle, out on the grains of sand and delicately places the cooler next to the blue towel.

You point to the cooler, “What’s that?”

He flops onto the blue fabric and shields his eyes as he looks up at you, “Momma made us some lunch. Said I’m useless at lunch– says I make a mean dinner, but I don’t know how to make lunch light enough for travel.”

You sit next to him on the purple towel. You wonder if he got it just for you. “Well, what momma says, goes.”

He chuckles, “Yes, it does.”

His eyes meet yours in a stare that’s so intimate and personal you think it might be inappropriate to do in front of all these people. His eyes are the prettiest shade of brown you’ve ever seen, it’s almost like honey is dripping down from his hair and into his irises. They’re soft in that way that only the people who have been through too much can convey. You need to know why their softness matches yours.

You break eye contact and make grabby-hands at the cooler, “Gimme.”

You can feel the pause in the air as he holds his stare, looking you up and down, before he does as you tell him.

You pull open the cooler and in it is a sealed bowl of cut apples (which have browned slightly, but are still beautifully crisp looking), two sandwiches you can’t yet identify the filling of, a couple arepas in a plastic bag, and two bottles of water.

A little note is attached to the top of the cooler, but Joel is quick to pull it away from your eyeshot. You try to ignore the curiosity that takes over you.

“Looks yummy,” you hum. 

He hums back, crossing his legs beneath him. “It is. My momma makes the best arepas in the world.”

“Tell your mom I said, ‘thank you for lunch’.”

“Of course, sugar.”

You fall into a comfortable silence as Joel lays out the food.

You take a bite of the arepa and moan in delight. You tell Joel you’ve never had anything better in your mouth in your life. He makes a joke that makes you choke and he loses it, slapping his legs and chortling so hard that he snorts, which makes you break out into unbridled laughter when you recover from your coughing fit.

It’s simple, easy– this thing with Joel. It feels good. It feels right.

You hear kids screaming and giggling as they run after each other, watching as they kick up sand under their feet. Parents watch on with matching grins on their faces, sitting under umbrellas with towels laid out under them. The kids make you smile too.

You can feel Joel’s eyes on you again. Maybe you just have a sixth sense for when Joel is looking at you. You wish he was always looking at you; inside and out. You wish you could rip your secrets out of your guts and give them to him and say, “Look at me. This is me.” You wish he’d show you his too.

Maybe someday.

When you’re finished with your lunch, you stand up and pull him with you up and towards the shore, leaving both of your shoes behind.

You take your first step into the water, bracing for the cold, but all you find is warmth. And you sigh in relief.

Joel’s arms wrap around your waist from behind you, his chin sitting on your shoulder, his hands gripping yours as you bring your arms up to his.

“Thank you,” he whispers into your ear.

You let out a breath of amusement, “For what?”

He kisses your shoulder, chapped lips on soft, sunkissed skin. “For being here.”

You hum.

“Let’s go find seashells.” You take his hand and drag him back towards the shore. He just nods and lets you take him wherever you want.

You spend the next hour searching the shore up and down for seashells. You find so many, that you have to take multiple trips back to your towels to deposit them. It’s good. You’ll leave most of them here for the creatures that use them as their homes, but you’ll take one home. One for you and one for Joel.

When you decide you’re done, you hand Joel your favorite– a purple and pink shell, one of the classic looking ones– and Joel hands you his– a gray shell with faint brown lines splaying out from the middle. You ask him why it’s his favorite and he says, “It’s simple. Does the job, doesn’t need to be all flashy.”

You have to stop yourself from laughing at the fact that Joel has somehow found the least interesting seashell on this beach and turned it into something beautiful and so him to you. He is so… perfect.

Your day continues, seashells stored safely in the cooler and the leftovers sprinkled back over the shore, except for a pink one that you give to a little girl who tugs on your dress and asks for it. You crouch down and hand it to her with a bright smile and a nod. You get the feeling again that Joel is watching you, observing you.

You and Joel end up in a splash fight at some point, soaked and cracking up at the shock on each other’s faces. You feel something you haven’t felt in a long time; unstoppable joy– joy that feels like it’s never going to end.

You build a sandcastle, which really ends up being more of a sand pyramid without any tools to assist you, but you love it just the same. You poke a stick into the top and call it a flag pole. Joel calls it a masterpiece, but he’s not looking at the sand, he’s looking at you.

The sun is starting to go down when Joel decides that it’s probably time to leave, but you force him to sit on the towels for a few more minutes as you watch the sun set. You can feel the sand all over you, it’s stuck in between your toes and your fingers, catches on the inside of your thighs as you rub them together in an attempt to get warmer. It’s gotten much colder as the sun goes down and your sundress is not very good at keeping in heat.

Joel wraps his arm around you and pulls you into his side. You can’t help but glance down at his lips as you lift your head up to look at him.

The sunset makes him look heavenly. The shadows of the rising night make his features look softer, makes the brown of his hair shine in the dim glow. He is beautiful. What did you do to deserve a man this beautiful to give you the time of day?

He’s looking at you too, lips open slightly and eyes roaming your face. You watch him stop on your lips a few times before you just decide to do it.

You grab his face and bring it to yours in a kiss you know you’ll remember for the rest of your life.

You knew his lips would feel like an oasis in the desert, despite the fact that they were chapped from a lack of water and his beard is slightly tickling your upper lip, but this is so intense, it feels almost better than that. Like finding the other half of your soul and fusing into one. Like entering heaven and feeling at peace for the first time in your life.

His lips are moving against yours now, tongue sneaking its way into your mouth,, but it’s not desperate. It’s searching, exploratory, like he’s trying to figure out who you are and how to make you his.

You break the kiss, the need to breathe takes over and you look up through your eyelashes at Joel, “That was…”

“Amazing, sugar. Best kiss of my life,” he breathes out.

You feel your face get hot under his gaze.

Not able to stand the feeling rushing through you, you stand and hold your hand out for him. He takes it and you help pull him up.

“Let’s get you home, baby.” He picks up your stuff and makes his way to the truck, but not without another chaste kiss from you first. You hope you’ll be getting a lot more of those in your future.

You don’t want to leave him. He feels like home.

✦ ✦ ✦

It takes a few hours, most of it humming along to the radio and staring longingly at Joel from your seat with your hand in his, but you’re back in front of your dorm. You’ve been sitting in his truck for the last couple minutes, knees tucked into your chest, as you waited for “Material Girl” to end, insisting that he had to let it play the whole song or you’d put him on some kind of hitlist. He would’ve let you do anything you wanted, threat of a hitlist or not, you know that.

When it’s done, he switches the music off and sits in the silence.

He mutters your name, “I– I got something to tell ya.”

You turn your head to look at him, it still laying on your knees. He looks scared, eyebrows furrowed and hand scratching his beard.

“Sure, anything.”

He makes you stew in the sound of the old truck rumbling for a moment while he thinks over what he’s about to say. It makes you nervous, his hesitation. 

“I’ve got a daughter.”

Your heart falls to the ground beneath you. You can’t help but lift your head and scrunch your face up in confusion.

A daughter?

You have a daughter?

Are you like him?

God, please, don’t be like him.

“Oh… Wow!”

He runs a hand through his hair, “Yeah.”

What do you say to that? How are you supposed to respond like a normal human being? 

“What’s her name?” Good enough.

“Sarah. Sarah Esperanza Miller. Gave her my momma’s name. Esperanza, that is. Her first name is Manda’s momma’s.”

“That’s a pretty name,” you reply, mystified.

A daughter.

This young man sitting in front of you is a father. You suspect you should’ve seen it sooner. Seen it in the way he holds himself, like he’s always half-awake, like he is in constant need of a nap. Seen it in the way he shows up for work with applesauce strewn across his shirt. Seen it in the way he doesn’t bother to shave for weeks at a time– lets his scruff grow into a beard before he finally decides to cut it all off again. Seen it in the way he cares so deeply, like he would give all of himself just for the people he loved to have everything they ever wanted.

But, you guess your dad was never really sober long enough for you to notice what a father should look like.

“I’d like to think so,” he chuckles lightly.

“How old is she?”

“Turned four in July. Had a princess birthday party for her. Didn’t stop wearing the damn tiara for a month afterwards,” he smiles, eyes misty like he’s reliving the memory right in front of you.

“Well, if I had a tiara, I’d wear it all the time too.” You let out a little breath of a laugh.

He chuckles, “I bet you would, sugar.”

He looks you up and down, evaluating your reaction to his news. You don’t know what he sees, because if you’re honest, you don’t know what you feel.

He nods once, looking back out to the street in front of you. Guess he found what he was looking for.

“Manda got pregnant when we were seventeen. Stupid– didn’t use protection like we should’ve. We had just graduated high school when she gave birth to Sarah. Got married a couple months after that cause our daddy’s told us we had to, especially hers. He told her she was a whore, kicked her out the house, told her he’d never let her step into his house again if we didn’t get married like we were supposed to.

“Supposed to,” he scoffs, “We should’ve never got married. She was a free-spirit. Never liked being in one place for long. A couple weeks after Sarah’s second birthday, she left us. Nothing but a note and the divorce papers.”

He sighs, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel.

Twenty-two and a single-father. You think he might be the bravest man you’ve ever met.

“Anyways,” he sighs, looking back to you, “Sarah’s my whole life. Everything I do is for her. And I know that’s a lot, ‘specially cause we’re so young and you’re still in school. I don’t wanna put that kinda’ pressure on you. So, this is me givin’ you an out, if you want it.”

You tilt your head to him as he continues, “But, I just want you to know that I’m all in–” he points to you and then him– “this, us– I’m all in.”

This is a tipping point. Whatever decision you made was going to change everything. If you said no, you were never going to see this man again– this man who just gave you one of the best days of your life and respected you and liked you. You wouldn’t even be able to give him a chance to show you how great life with him could be. But if you said yes, you would be committing to a relationship with a man who was already so grown-up, a man with a child. Would that make you… would that make you a mother if it all worked out with Joel?

“This is… a lot,” you mutter, eyes flicking to his hunched frame, highlighted in the dim, flickering glow of the street lights surrounding you.

Your lungs aren’t filling all the way. You can’t breathe.

His face falls, hopeful eyes going misty. “Yeah, it’s alright– I understand.”

Oh no, that’s not what you meant.

“But– I… Joel, this is a lot,” you blurt out, both hands flying out to grab his right hand, “But, I wanna give it some thought. Can I… Can I have some time to think about this?”

The softness comes back to his face, “Of course, sugar. Take all the time you need.”

His hand shifts between yours so it takes your left and he squeezes it lightly.

“Thank you. For telling me.” You squeeze back. Tears are stinging your eyes, desperate to escape their prison, to show the man in front of you that you aren’t ready for this, aren’t made for this. It takes everything in you to keep them at bay.

“Thank you for not bolting,” he chuckles, “I tried dating once since Manda left and… let’s just say it did not go too well.”

His face scrunches up in mock disgust and you laugh lightly. Your chest hurts with the effort. You feel the overwhelming need to bolt.

You hesitate, hand reaching for the door blindly behind you, “I’ve gotta– I’ve gotta go. I’ve got a lot of assignments to do tomorrow. But, I’ll call you. Later.”

He looks you up and down, smile fading, scrutinizing gaze evaluating you. Please, you beg to anyone who will listen, please don’t let him see it.

He nods, face expressionless, “Okay. See ya.”

He saw.

You open the door and climb out. You turn around and grab the lowered window in a last ditch effort to comfort yourself, maybe him too. He is real. He is kind. He is not him.

“This isn’t goodbye, Joel.” You hope that isn’t a lie. 

He nods. You think you might see his eyes glistening when they catch the light. You can’t breathe.

You want to kiss him so badly that it hurts to pull away, like ripping your soul apart and leaving it open and bloody for everyone to watch as you bleed out.

Your hand falls back to your side. And you jog across the street and walk to the door of your building. Walk, not bolt.

✦ ✦ ✦

Joel curses himself as he watches you walk away, dress swaying in the wind of the oncoming rain.

Why didn’t he say something sooner?

Fuck.

He can’t breathe. Can’t even get himself to leave.

He thought he found it, someone who he could let into his life, but of course he had to fuck that up like he always does.

He wasn’t lying when he had told you that he was all in. He thinks maybe he was being dramatic or just trying too hard to get you to stay, but he understands now, breath not quite getting to his lungs, that he meant it. Meant every word of it.

He scared you. He didn’t want to scare you anymore with his self-inflicted hurt, so he made sure you didn’t see it– left his face stoic as you walked away. He hopes that didn’t scare you either.

His chest burns. It hurts. But he needs to get home. Tommy is waiting for him. Sarah is waiting for him.

“Fuck,” he yells, slamming his hands into the steering wheel. And he drives away, tears blurring his vision and raindrops falling heavily on his windshield

✦ ✦ ✦

When you open the door to your room, you can hear moaning coming from Elaine’s side of the room. The curtain around her bed is drawn, a red glow emanating from the pink, strawberry-covered curtain.

You debate turning around, sitting in one of the band practice rooms in the basement and wait for Elaine to page you to say you can come up. You’ve done it before. She hadn’t been very happy with you afterwards, demanding that next time you just subtly announce your arrival and she would stop and send her partner on their way.

Before you can even end the debate in your mind, the door shuts loudly behind you and the moaning stops abruptly.

You wince as you hear rustling, swears and what you can only assume is clothing being thrown. A few moments later, Elaine’s messy hair peeks out of the curtain and she squints her eyes in the darkness to see you. 

“Hey, baby girl. What’s going on?”

You hear a woman’s voice come quietly from behind her, “Who the fuck is that?”

She hushes them, holding a finger up to her lips.

Turning back to you, she sighs, “Are you alright, baby?”

You sniff, voice watery, “Yeah, I just wanted to go to bed, but I can go.”

Elaine’s eyes go wide as she disappears behind the curtain again and hisses, “You have to leave.”

Dread runs down your spine.

You hadn’t meant to ruin her… whatever this was.

You hear them talk to each other in hushed tones, but you can’t hear exactly what they’re saying. It doesn’t matter. You just need to get out.

You turn to leave, heaving breaths only filling your lungs halfway. Fuck, fuck, fuck…

You hear Elaine’s stern voice as she yells at you from behind the fabric, “If that’s you leaving, I will kill you. Stay where you are.”

You freeze.

A woman stumbles out of Elaine’s heightened bed and barely makes it to the ground standing. She glares at you, as she fumbles to put her heels back on. She looks mean. She looks exactly like Elaine’s type.

“I am so sorry–”

“Don’t you dare apologize to her. She is fine,” Elaine cuts you off as she slides gracefully out of her bed and lands with a soft thud on the carpet. She’s got mascara running down her face and she’s wearing a baby tee and men’s boxers like she always is– this time it’s Barbie’s decapitated head on a pink background and gray shorts. Despite the fact that she looks like she just had sex (which she had, or was trying to before you had fucking interrupted her), she looks gorgeous.

“But, I–”

She puts a finger up in the air, silencing you.

Elaine’s blonde is done putting her shoes on and is at the door with a scowl on her face, “E, you cannot be serious.”

“Go away before I punch you in the boob,” she states with a finality that makes the girl turn around and go, but not without rolling her eyes first.

Before the door is even done shutting behind her, Elaine is hugging you fiercely and pulling back before you even get the chance to melt into it, cupping your cheeks in her hands.

“What the fuck happened, baby?”

Your mind is off the blonde already. She holds you while you cry, and you try to take deep breaths that just stop short in your lungs. She cares– she has always cared.

You tell her about the drive there and the CDs that he had bought just for you and the seashells (fuck the seashells) and the way he held you as you watched the sunset together and…

“A child, Lane! He has a daughter. How could he not tell me he had a daughter?”

Elaine is spinning around in her desk chair, chest squished into the backrest, face turned up at the ceiling, her long, curly, red hair bouncing as it swirls around her. This is her thinking position.

You’re pacing back and forth, still in the dress and sandals you wore to the beach. You think you might be trailing sand into the rug below you. You’ll vacuum it later when you’re not absolutely panicking. 

“Well, maybe he was scared.” She gets louder and quieter as her spinning pulls her voice around the room.

You throw your hands up in the air. “Well, now I’m scared!”

She hums, spinning coming to a stop. 

“Is it a good scared or a bad scared?”

You turn to her with narrowed eyes and furrowed brows, “What could that possibly mean?”

“It means are you scared that you like him too much, or are you scared you don’t like him enough?”

You blink at her, wide eyes trained on her own.

Slowly, you back up to your bed and jump onto the edge with a huff. Fuck. She knew you too well.

You think of his strong hands and his soft eyes. How he talks so candidly about his adoring mother and his troubled brother. How he lights up when he talks about his guitar. How he held you on the beach. How he so obviously loves his daughter. How you love that he loves so deeply.

Love.

You shrink into yourself, arms wrapping around your bent knees, nose tucking into the space between your legs.

“Too much.”

You can hear her brain working from the other side of the room, her nails clicking together as her mouth tries to catch up with her brain.

“Is this really a bad thing?”

Your head whips out from its hiding place, “What?”

She shrugs, “I mean, I don’ know. You like him and if he has a kid, and is supporting her well, doesn’t that mean he’s mature? That he might be a good person to depend on? To love?”

Love.

You can follow her logic– you’d thought the exact same thing yourself.

“But, that means that I have to mother a child. I don’t know how to be a mother! You know I don’t know how to do that,” you ramble.

She scoffs, getting up from her chair and making her way over to you, “No, it don’t. Baby, you have no idea what this means. You told me that he knew this might be too much, especially since you’re so young. And I know that you don’t do too well with parental figures.”

You nod slowly. She’s right. She’s always right.

She smiles, taking your face in her hands again, “Tell him how you feel. Make it clear to him that you wanna try with him and that you have reservations about the whole ‘daughter’ thing. I think it’s good that he told you before it was too late.”

You search her green eyes for a sign, for something to latch onto. To tell you this is a bad idea. To leave him behind. But all you find is her usual raw honesty and adoration for you. She wouldn’t tell you to do something you weren’t ready for.

“‘Sides, you ain’t even fucked him yet, so that can really determine if he’s worth the time or not.”

She giggles as you push her away from you with your feet on her chest.

“I hate you.”

“No, you don’t, baby girl.”

You hold a hand out to her and she takes it, soft hand enveloping yours. Pulling her into your chest, you sigh and wrap your arms around her shoulders and your legs around her waist– a common position for the two of you. Elaine jokingly refers to it as your “clingy sloth” hug.

“No… I don’t.”

✦ ✦ ✦

To: Joel

From: Me

i wanna try, but we need to talk

series masterlist | masterlist of all masterlists 🌼 | eras masterlist 🌻

[moesnotifs]

mine | 1. wondering why we bother with love

pairing: young!no-outbreak!joel miller x f!reader

chapter summary: a regular day at work turns into the beginning of something joel never thought would happen to him again.

chapter warnings: joel is 22 and reader is 20, mentions of a bad marriage and teenage pregnancy, reader is described a small amount (has hair, able-bodied, wears feminine clothing, is going to school for secondary english education, has a heavily-detailed background including a sister), joel being the single dad™, southern banter and teasing, fluff, joel being a flirt, baby sarah being her dad's favorite, if i missed anything let me know

word count: 3.6k (future chapters will be longer)

a/n: good lord, this got some attention!!! i'm so fucking grateful for it. really excited for you guys to read this. hope you like it. lemme know what you think. any reblogs and likes are appreciated <3

series masterlist | next chapter ->

You were in college, working part-time waiting tables

Left a small town, never looked back

I was a flight risk, with a fear of fallin'

Wondering why we bother with love, if it never lasts

✦ ✦ ✦

October 1994

At seventeen-years-old, Joel Miller found out that his girlfriend was pregnant. It was startling and overbearing and horrifying and it made him want to scream at the sky, at God or whatever was up there and curse them for fucking up his life. He told Amanda that he was there for her, would do anything for her, but he was scared shitless.

At eighteen, he was holding a baby in the hospital with a ring on his left hand and thanking whatever was up there for bringing him a healthy baby girl to hold for the rest of his life. Maybe it was too soon, but as soon as he laid eyes on her, he knew. He knew he would love Sarah for the rest of his life and even beyond that. But, Amanda held her for a second and gave her back to him. He knew that she resented him– could tell by the way she fidgeted with the ring on her finger, pulling it off and then putting it back on, scowling at it when she thought he wasn’t looking. They moved into a small apartment near the college campus in Austin right before the baby was born. He could tell she hated that too. He knew he could grin and bear it, as long as Sarah got to have two parents.

At twenty, he came home from his job at the small diner across the street to their small apartment where his little girl was crying in her crib and a note sat on the counter that read, “I’m just not built to be a mother or a wife, Joel.” All of her things were gone. It was like she’d never been there at all.

That night, he held Sarah in his arms and cried. He watched her big, curious eyes as his tears ran down her face and soaked into her pink pajamas. He thinks maybe she knew what was going on– the toddler was always more ahead than he ever was. It only took a day for her to start begging for her mother, sobbing in Joel’s arms as he held her tight to his chest, hushing in her ear, trying to sing any lullaby he could think of. It took her two months to stop bringing her up at all.

By twenty-two, he’s a fully-functioning single dad. He has a stable job at the diner and does some contracting with his brother on the side. His mom helps him watch Sarah while he’s working– shows him pictures of her on her digital camera she insists on bringing with her everywhere when he gets back from work. There’s a wall in his kitchen dedicated to his favorites. He never stops thanking her for everything she does for him.

Sarah is growing beautifully. Her curly hair is a mess, but he’s trying his best to learn how to do it right. Amanda had always done it before– pigtails and braids perfectly set on her tiny head. But he finds that her thick hair is hard to tame on his own. He takes her to the salon downtown for them to do her braids whenever he can afford it. Her big brown eyes could make him do anything– she knows just how to work him with her wet, puppy dog stare and pouty lips. She’s up to his knees now. Everytime he comes home from work, she’ll run to him and crash into his calves and he can’t help but smile everytime she does it.

She’s his world, his everything.

It’s a Sunday morning. He always works Sunday mornings because the church crowd always tips well and today is no different. Sweat is dripping down his back from running around, and his brain feels like it’s split in half with all the orders stuffed in his head. The diner’s small enough that he’s only one of two servers working, despite how ridiculously busy it is, but he doesn’t mind. He can’t mind, really.

“Donald! Where’s my pancakes?”

The owner of the establishment’s balding head peaks out of the kitchen, as he yells back at him, “In your ass, Miller!”

“Hilarious,” he deadpans, pushing an order sheet back into the kitchen for Donald to grab, “Hurry it up, please. Mr. Cassini is starting to get hangry again.”

Donald laughs boisterously, “Oh, that old man is always angry!”

Joel waves him off, “Just do it, Don.”

“No problem, kid!”

He turns around and there’s a new patron sitting at one of his tables. A woman, body guarded, eyes on alert, evaluating the diner for the closest exits. You look scared, but only in the way that prey does when it knows it’s safe– waiting for the next predator to flash its teeth at your trembling form. Your hair is wet, as well as the tops of your shoulders, which are tucked into a large hoodie that swallows you. He didn’t realize it was raining. Your sneaker-clad feet are tucked under your legs, criss-cross-applesauce on the soft leather of the booth beneath you.

You’re beautiful.

Tapping his pencil against his order pad, he approaches you carefully. You look like you’ll run for the hills if he takes you by surprise. But, his tapping seems to alert you of his presence, as your head turns towards him. You watch him with a discerning look and fold your hands on your lap.

He pulls out the Southern charm his momma taught him, smile and all, hoping it might ease your cautiousness, “Hello, ma’am. Can I get you something to drink?”

You look surprised– eyebrows raised and eyes wide, like you didn’t expect him to talk. It’s odd, he thinks.

“Oh– uh–” you look down to the menu he placed in front of you upon his approach– “Iced tea?”

Just from your voice alone– and piled onto the fact that he knows everyone around here, and he’s damn sure he’s never seen a woman as pretty as you before– he knows you aren’t from around here. He has the sudden and all-consuming need to know everything about you. Why are you here? Who the hell are you?

“You need a lemon with that, sweetheart?” He can’t keep his eyes off you.

“Oh, no, no. Sugar is good enough for me.” As if to prove your point, you pull a couple packets of Sweet ‘N Low out of the small container at the end of the table and toss them next to the menu splayed out in front of you.

“Alright, darlin’. One iced tea comin’ up.” He pulls out a wink for you and walks away. He isn’t prepared to see the aftermath of his overconfidence. He really hopes you don’t run.

And he finds that you haven’t when he comes back with your iced tea in his hand. He places it down in front of you with a, Here you go, hon, and asks if you want anything to eat, and you decline. He rushes to get to his other customers. Tips are more important than the beautiful woman, he has to tell himself, but he finds that his eyes drift to you as you dump three pink packets of the sweetener into your tea and swirl it around. He shakes his head in amusement when you pull a book out of the backpack sitting next to you and start to read.

✦ ✦ ✦

When he comes back to check on you again, you’ve downed your glass of tea and you’re squinting your eyes as you write on the page of the book in front of you, underlining a passage you determine is worthy of note, not once, not twice, but three times. He thinks he sees the words ‘idealized love’ as he pours more tea from the pitcher he brought with him into your plastic cup.

“Whatcha readin’?”

Your eyes don’t even leave the page, pencil doesn’t cease writing as you reply, “The Great Gatsby.”

“Huh. Read that in high school. Kinda sad, ain’t it?”

You place your pencil down in the crease of your paperback, still reading, “I suppose so.”

It’s gone quiet in the diner now that the Church crowd has left, the sound of the jukebox in the corner the only background noise remaining. Only people here now are you and Mr. Cassini, but he’s preoccupied with Doreen, the other waitress on duty today. They’re flirting in the way that old people do, with shy smiles and boisterous laughter. He thinks he can take a quick break.

He sits down on the booth across from you and you look up at him for the first time since he came back to fill your tea.

“What’re you doing,” you ask– not in anger or annoyance, but just genuine confusion.

“Sittin’. This book for pleasure or school?”

You seem to accept his presence here with you as your new, temporary situation and put your bookmark– a pressed leaf– back in your book and close it shut. “School.”

He hums, disappointment dripping down his back, “You in high school then?”

Your eyebrows furrow before you seem to realize where he is drawing his conclusion from, “Oh! No, no. I’m studying to be an English teacher. We’re supposed to read this and come up with a fake lesson plan.”

Relief replaces the disappointment just as quickly as it had come.

“Huh. Interesting.”

You shrug, “I’d like to think so.”

He shuffles in his seat, pressing the cold leather against his sweltering back. “So, what– you gonna be a high school teacher?”

“I’m trying to. It’s hard work.” You pull out a few more packets of sweetener and pour them into your new cup of tea. He tries his best not to smile, but he can feel the corners of his lips pulling at his skin.

“Hard work is good for the soul– shows you got guts. That’s what my momma always says, anyways.”

You grin, “She sounds real smart, your mamma.” He hears you emulating his accent, teasing him for being so incredibly cliché, but he’s so focused on your blinding smile that he can’t even fight back.

“She is. She’s the best I could ask for.”

“Good. Everyone deserves a good mom,” you say, your smile almost turns sad as you say it. He wants to grab your face and beg you to tell him why what you said makes you sad, where’s your good mom that you deserve?

“Joel Miller, what are you doin’, sittin’ down? Get your ass up and clean some tables,” Donald yells from across the diner. Joel doesn’t even flinch– used to his sour attitude from almost four years of working here. But he watches you flinch, eyes going wide. You look warily over to Donald, assessing the situation, before you look back over to him.

You clear your throat, “It seems like you need to be getting to work, Joel Miller.”

You're teasing him again, but he can tell you’re nervous. He smiles, trying to calm your nerves as much as he can, and he thinks it works as he watches your shoulders relax slightly.

He chuckles, muttering to you conspiratorially, “Bitter old man, can’t see I’m trying to get myself a date over here.”

Your eyes flick down to your book and back up to him. Biting your lip, trying to suppress the smile he can see taking over your face, you reply, “Get back to work.”

“Alright, alright, sugar. I’m going,” he concedes, hands flying up in surrender.

The grin finally takes over your lips again and he swears he’s never seen anything more beautiful– besides his own baby girl’s smile. 

A name falls from your upturned lips.

“Huh?”

You laugh, opening your book back up and pulling yourself back into the story, “My name, Joel Miller.”

He repeats it back to you. It tastes like honey and sweetener on his tongue.

He wonders what you would taste like on his tongue.

“I’m getting off in 30 minutes.” An invitation.

You look back up at him. “Well, then, I guess I got another thirty minutes to read before you’re bothering me again.” You accept.

“I suppose you do.” He turns back to the counter and walks away. He can feel the pull to go back to you, to indulge himself in you further, but he needs the money and the extra $3 for the next thirty minutes could be the difference between his baby girl getting a full meal or not, and Donald has a nasty habit of not paying the full amount if he ain’t working, so he picks up a rag and gets back to work.

✦ ✦ ✦

Thirty minutes later, he’s pulling off his apron and bounding out of the backroom towards the table you’ve made a home of. He finds that you’ve packed up your things into your lavender bookbag, like you’re ready for whatever he throws at you– to go wherever he’s going to take you.

He wastes no time; he doesn’t want to be here anymore. “You wanna go on a walk?”

You nod your head eagerly. It seems you’re in agreement.

The pavement is a dark gray beneath your purple sneakers and his steel-toed boots, a pair his momma gave him for his 18th birthday. They’re good for work– sturdy, not too sweaty or uncomfortable. He wears them everyday. He wonders if you like cowboy boots, hopes you don’t find them tacky.

It’s still light out, around six in the afternoon. It stopped raining an hour ago, but the humidity still lies heavy in the air as the two of you make your way outside. It’s hot, but only in the way that Texas is in the middle of October. It’s comforting, like laying in front of a fire on a cold day.

He stuffs his hands in his jacket pockets. He wants to take your hand, can feel his fingers twitching with the exertion of forcing himself to stop. You don’t even know him– he doesn’t want to scare you off yet.

You look to him for directions and he tilts his head forward and down the street, starting your walk at a slow, but steady, pace.

Austin is busy this time of year, what with all the college students a month or so into their return for the fall semester. The bars they pass are full of drunk students on  full-weekend benders and loud music. Stupid decisions and disco lighting. Sometimes he’s glad he was able to avoid all that. Sometimes he misses having the option of making mistakes.

He clears his throat, “Where you from, darlin’?”

You smile, kicking a rock with the edge of your sneaker, “Oh, is it that obvious that I’m not a Texas girl?”

If the lack of the local accent and not recognizing you wasn’t enough, the way you held yourself would be the obvious give away to him– nervous, on-guard. He finds that people around here aren’t scared of being too loud or in the way of anyone or anything. It was plain to him that you couldn’t stand the idea of getting in anyone’s way.

“Kinda,” he chuckles.

You hesitate, looking away from him and to the uneven sidewalk below you both, like you’re trying to decide if you should lie to him or not.

“Seattle.”

That takes him by surprise, but he hopes it doesn’t show too much. What in the hell were you doing all the way down here?

So many questions left unanswered in the aftermath of you.

“Woah– long way from home, aren’t we?”

Your smile doesn’t quite reach your eyes. “Yeah— yeah, I am.”

Home, family seem to be sore topics for you. He makes a note to avoid it.

“Never been to Seattle. In fact, I’ve never left Texas.”

Your eyebrows lift. “Really? Washington’s beautiful.”

“Lotsa rain, I hear.”

You let out a breath of amusement, “You hear correctly. It's one of the only things I miss about it. Texas isn’t exactly known for its rain.”

He snorts, “No, it ain’t. But, you got yourself some today. Bet that was nice.”

You nod. It’s a few moments of comfortable silence before you speak again.

“You from around here?”

He nods once, pushing his hands even further into his pockets in embarrassment, “Lived in Austin my whole life.”

“Joel Miller, you’ve gotta get out of Texas,” you laugh.

You’re beautiful when you laugh. Your smile lights up your whole face like the sun as you throw your head back towards the dreary sky, eyes crinkled by the pull of your cheeks.

He sighs lightly, “Yeah, ‘spose I do.”

You seem to realize something as you do a quick scan of your surroundings before you look back at him with narrowed eyes and a playful smirk.

“Miller, where are we going,” you draw out.

“Nowhere,” he mimics your drawn out syllables, “Just walkin’.”

You hum, “Hm, and I don’t suppose that nowhere is in the general direction of my college campus and that you may be ‘just walkin’ ‘ me to my dorm like the Southern gentleman you are?”

He chuckles, bashfully scratching the back of his neck, “Maybe.”

You pause, look him up and down, and then sigh, “Thank you, Joel.”

“It’s no problem, sugar.”

He lets you take the lead now that you’re approaching the campus, slowing his steps so he could keep up with you. You scrunch your eyebrows at the ground below you and pucker your lips, opening your mouth and then closing it again. When Sarah does that, he calls her ‘fishy’. He desperately wants to tell you about her, but he finds himself once again fighting the urge so he doesn’t scare you off. Not yet, he tells himself.

You look up at him again, eyes wide and biting your bottom lip, “Why do you keep calling me that?”

He’s staring. He knows he’s staring at your mouth, but he can’t help it. They’re like a siren song he can’t resist. He can’t think straight when you’re next to him. 

He shakes his head, trying to clear his thoughts like an Etch-A-Sketch, “What?”

“‘Sugar’. Why do you keep calling me that?” You glance over at him, but quickly look back at the ground when you catch him staring at you. He can tell you’re flustered.

“Oh, well, I watched you pour three packets of sweetener in your tea like a maniac. So, I figured that was an appropriate nickname.”

You scoff, throwing your hands up in the air, a grin growing on your face, “Hey, that is a very appropriate amount of sweetener, thank you very much! I thought you Southerners adored your sweet tea.”

“Darlin’, if all us ‘Southerners’ drank three packets of sweetener with our iced tea, we would all be dying at a very young age.”

“Well then, I’ll die a very sugar-high and happy, young woman.”

He laughs– one of those real laughs that only his family can bring out of him. He can’t remember the last time he laughed like this in public.

“Y’know, if you’re gonna die young, sugar, I don’t know if it’s such a good idea that I do what I was about to do.”

You stop in front of the tall brick building in front of you, clicking your heels together, and playfully furrow your eyebrows again. You’ve reached your destination. This is goodbye. He doesn’t want it to be.

“And what were you about to do, Joel Miller?”

“Ask you on a date,” he smiles and you smirk, “But… if you’re planning on an early demise, darlin’, I don’t wanna get my heart broken.”

“And if I promised to cut back?” You’re approaching him quietly– two feet turning into almost chest-to-chest in a few agonizing seconds.

“Then, I’ll have to take you out to make sure you keep your promise– now, won’t I?”

He watches from the corner of his eye as you pull a piece of paper out of your hoodie pocket and stuff it in his own. The soft, fleeting feeling of your hand brushing his makes a shiver run down his spine. Your hand quickly retreats.

You look up at him with mischief in your eyes, “I guess you will.”

Before he can even blink or think or process, you're kissing his cheek with a tenderness he hasn’t felt in years– eyes closed and big grin plastered on your face. He knows he’s blushing; the heat is crawling up his face ruthlessly.

You pull away and start to walk toward your building. He lifts a hand to his face in hopes that you left something there, evidence that you were real, evidence that what just happened wasn’t a figment of his imagination. But all he can feel is his own stubble. He hopes it didn’t hurt your lips. Maybe he should shave when he gets home.

“Call me, Joel Miller,” you shout over your shoulder, grinning brightly.

“How,” he shouts back.

“Look in your pocket!” You point to your own in emphasis.

His eyebrows pull together as he pulls the paper out of his pocket and reads it. Ten digits sitting pretty in red at the top with your name sitting on the bottom, a heart colored in with purple highlighter drawn next to it.

He goes to tell you thank you, or declare something he’s not even sure of himself, but when he looks back up to the doors of your building, you’re gone. The only evidence that you were ever real sits in his hands like a promise.

He rushes home before his mom starts to worry about where he went. He can’t wait to tell her all about you.

series masterlist | masterlist of all masterlists 🌼 | eras masterlist 🌻

[moesnotifs]

mine | j.l.

pairing: young!no-outbreak!joel x f!reader

series description: Joel is suddenly the 22-year-old single dad of a four-year-old with no one to help support her but himself. He gets a job as a waiter in a diner downtown to make ends meet. One day, you come in-- a tired, overworked college student with a past that haunts you-- in need of break from the rain. He decides right then and there that he is yours for the rest of your lives.

or, my obligatory young!joel fic where he gets the love he deserves and sarah gets herself a mom

series warnings: any pictures i use are simply for aesthetic purposes and in no way reflect the reader's appearance, joel is 22 & reader is 20 at the beginning of the fic, reader is described a small amount (has hair, able-bodied, wears feminine clothing, is going to school for secondary english education, has a heavily-detailed background including a sister), descriptions of alcoholism and parental neglect, baby sarah, joel is a 22-year-old divorcee, talks of marriage and pregnancy, more warnings will be added later

chapter 1: wondering why we bother with love

tbw

chapter 2: we were sitting there by the water

tbw

chapter 3: we'll never make my parent's mistakes

tbw

chapter 4: you saw me start to believe

tbw

chapter 5: braced myself for the goodbye

tbw

chapter 6: she is the best thing that's ever been mine

tbw

epilogue: i can see it now

tbw

chapter names and warnings are subject to change, as i am not done writing them yet.