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savedyounine · 7 days ago

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The Spaces Between [Joel Miller]

pairings: no-outbreak!joel miller x f!reader

wordcount: 3.5K ish

cw: toxic relationship, implied sexual content, mentions of deceased spouse, unhealthy coping mechanisms, mild profanity, themes of loneliness and emotional pain, brief mentions of blood and violence, alcohol consumption, allusions to financial hardship, alternate universe

a/n: it started as a blurb and ended up being 3K. wasn’t planning on posting this as i’m working on the secret santa story, but i changed my mind. hope you enjoy it, tell me what you think. reblog and heart, leave a comment or slide into my dms.

main blog: savedyounine | discord: saveyouanine

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Autumn arrives overnight, like someone flipped a switch and the whole world changed from green to gold while no one was looking.

Joel drives home with the windows down, breathing air that smells like wood smoke and wet leaves. The stop sign looms red and he slows, braking harder than strictly necessary, just to feel the truck respond to his hand; just to impose his will on something in this world.

His thoughts drift to you, as they always do in the in-between—those restless spaces caught between day and night, between the world and the small, stolen corners you’ve carved out together.

You’ll be clocking out right about now, peeling off that ugly brown polyester dress like it’s a second skin you’ve been dying to shed. He knows how much you hate it. He’s seen the way you claw at the collar when you think no one’s watching, like it’s some cruel, small thing choking the air out of you. You’ll then give Glenda that tired smile—thin, practiced, the kind that doesn’t even bother trying to touch your eyes—before slipping out the back door.

That door sticks, you told him once. You’d laughed when he asked why you always smelled faintly of coffee grounds and fryer grease. "Gotta shove it with my hip to get it loose," you’d said, and then you showed him—with that little twist of your body that nearly made him grab you right there in the parking lot.

There’s probably some kind of metaphor in that door, he thinks as he navigates these dark, empty streets. Something about how you’re always pushing, always forcing your way through things that don’t want to give. Always fighting against some invisible weight, something tethering you to this small, tired life you’re stuck living. It’s like you’ve been shoving at it so long, you don’t even remember what it feels like to walk through a door that opens without a fight.

What a pair you make, he thinks, almost bitterly. Him with his calloused hands and the bullet scar on his thigh, you with your night shifts and your secret cigarettes. His nightmares smell like blood and metal. Yours probably smell like scorched bacon grease and the sour stink of other people’s messes.

And Joel doesn’t know, not really, if this thing between you, if it’s just a habit or something more—two broken things that fit together because they don’t fit anywhere else. For love, for him, has always felt like a sharp edge—something to be gripped carefully, bled on quietly. He wonders if you feel it too, the way it cuts. Maybe that’s why you never ask him to stay. Maybe that’s why he never does.

And tonight, just like any other time, you’ll be waiting for him. But there's no rush. It's not like the early days, all frantic hands and panting breaths in the cab of his truck, trying to work a leg free of your jeans without concussing yourself on the steering wheel.

Now it’s a slower kind of hunger, deeper, heavier—an ache that settles in your chest, the way an old break throbs before the storm hits. And yet, he never stays over, even though he knows the curve of your spine better than his own heartbeat.

Old dog, new tricks, all that bullshit. Wham, bam, thank you ma'am. Like a goddamn cliché.

—

Winter hits like a gut punch. It always does. Joel wakes to the dull, gray light slipping through the crack in his blackout curtains and the distant grind of city plows against asphalt. From the bed, all he can see is white. The radiator clatters and hisses like it’s falling apart, but it’s warm, so he doesn’t bother kicking it. He didn’t dream last night. Small mercies.

It's a bad day for driving, road crews already behind on salting and sanding, but he goes anyway. Tells himself it's just to get out of the house. Not that he's got anyone to convince. It's been twelve years and he still puts on his ring every morning like a reflex. Dead woman's jewelry. He doesn't know why he bothers except that he always has.

The highway twists and coils under his tires, a snake waiting to strike, and his truck is just another poor, dumb creature trapped in its grip. Every overpass is a test, another betrayal waiting to happen, the rear tires threatening to slip, to skid, to send him spinning off the edge. His hands cramp, locked at ten and two like rigor mortis has already set in. Yet he keeps going, some animal part of his brain needing to see you, needing to reassure himself that you exist as more than a ghost of stale cigarette smoke and the memory of soft thighs.

You don’t look surprised to see him when he shows up on your doorstep, snowflakes clinging to his boots and his shoulders. It’s your day off. He can tell by the ratty bathrobe tied haphazardly around you, one slipper dangling from your foot, the other abandoned somewhere out of sight.

“Figured that rust bucket of yours wouldn’t make it this far,” you say. A smile flickers at the corner of your mouth before dying out like a struck match.

You look at him the way you always do, cutting through him like it’s easy, like you’ve been reading him since the day he was born. It should terrify him. Instead, he’s just too damn tired of flinching.

"Ain't nothing wrong with my truck that a little elbow grease can't fix." He goes to push past you into the narrow foyer but you just pull your robe tighter around yourself. “You gonna let me in, or are we doing this out in the snow?” It comes out rougher than he means it to, all sharp edges and too little patience, but you don’t call him on it.

Resigned, you step aside. “By all means.”

Your living room feels smaller every time he comes here. Not because of the space itself but because your life exists in the detritus of other people's cast offs. It hits him that he’s never asked you for the story behind the framed quote embroidery that reads "Bless this mess."

Thrift store chic and all that, he thinks. It fits, though.

You don’t offer him coffee. Don’t bother with small talk or pleasantries. You never do. You both know why he’s here.

An old dog after all.

—

The cold digs in and refuses to let go, clawing through March with frozen fingers. The snowbanks are shrinking, but not without a fight, revealing a winter's worth of garbage and dogshit and gray grass beaten flat.

It's a nothing season. An in-between. Something that’s caught halfway between dead and alive. Joel tries not to see himself in it, but the thought sticks anyway.

It’s been weeks since he’s seen you, and the ache of you has sunk into his bones, wedging itself into the spaces between his ribs. You still don’t talk about it, whatever this is. Whatever it isn’t. Labels are for the living and neither of you has qualified for years.

"You look like shit." That’s the first thing out of your mouth when you open the door. No hesitation, no soft landing. He doesn’t even blink, just pushes past you, shrugging off his coat and letting his boots fall wherever they want, like a trail of breadcrumbs leading nowhere good.

"Thanks," he mutters. His voice feels cracked and rusty, like something left out too long in the rain.

When was the last time he even said anything out loud? Nodded at the checkout girl maybe, grunted a thanks at the gas pump. But stringing a sentence together for someone else's ears is a lot fucking harder than he remembered.

You drag a hand down your face, fingers lingering at the corner of one tired eye. “You want a drink or something? Got beer. Or some expired orange juice if you’re feeling adventurous, but I wouldn’t recommend it.”

It’s more kindness than he deserves. Hell, more than he knows what to do with. He doesn’t belong here, doesn’t belong in your space, cluttered and worn down by yard sale finds and third-hand paperbacks.

"Beer's good."

He sidesteps a laundry pile—clean, dirty, who the hell knows—and watches as you reach into the fridge, grabbing two bottles. The caps clatter into the sink, and you hand him one without looking, like this is just what you do.

He tips the bottle back and drains half of it in two long swallows. It’s warm, a little stale, but it scratches down his throat just fine. He lets it burn, lets it bubble up like something familiar.

Your eyes are on him, too steady to be anything but a challenge.

"So."

It hangs there, pointed and waiting.

"So."

He drains the rest of the bottle. He doesn't know how to do this, this living. Doesn't know how to carve out space for himself in a world that keeps spinning. All he's got are his hands and the sour ache in his gut.

With a rueful shake of his head, he sets the empty bottle on the counter with an anticlimactic clink.

And then he's reaching for you, fingers finding the belt of your robe, dragging you against him. Your beer sloshes, dribbling foam, but he's already got his mouth on your neck, your pulse rabbit quick under his tongue. You make a noise, halfway between a sigh and a curse, and your head falls back. Surrendering.

And fuck, he doesn't deserve this either, the easy way you give and give. The way you fold into him like it costs you nothing. Like there isn’t a price for this, for the way he takes and takes and takes.

All that’s left is the hard press of the countertop against his hip, your fingers threading through his hair, and the quiet way you let him ruin you.

This is how it goes. How it always goes.

Until there’s nothing left.

—

Spring creeps in slow, almost shy, before it barrels in all at once. The crocuses you planted last fall push up through the half-frozen muck of the flower bed, fragile purple petals reaching for a sun that doesn’t quite remember how to warm anything yet. You’re out on the back porch sitting with your hair curling into the damp air while he rummages through your cabinets, stiff and slow, looking for coffee filters.

He didn’t sleep well. He doesn’t even remember closing his eyes, but there’s a blanket tangled at his feet now that wasn’t there when the two of you collapsed on your bed last night. He doesn’t ask.

"You don't have to stay, you know." Your voice floats into the kitchen, carried by the whine of the screen door snapping shut behind you. "Wouldn’t want to keep you from anything important."

A handful of answers rise like bile but he swallows them down. The thing between you is too fragile for words, a soap bubble balanced on a fingertip and he is already so goddamn tired of being the one who always pops it.

"I'm good." It's a day for small honesties.

You appear in the kitchen doorway, arms crossed, one hip tilted just so. The faded Metallica shirt you’re wearing as a nightgown barely reaches your thighs. He drags his eyes away from all that bare skin. Reaches for a mug instead.

Your eyebrows do something complicated. "Alright then."

You watch as he pours coffee for you both, the pot shaking slightly in his grip. If you notice, you don't comment. Just take the chipped mug emblazoned with "Carpe the fuck out of this diem" he offers. Your fingers don't touch and he tells himself he isn't disappointed.

"Milk’s in the fridge if you’re into that," you say, blowing softly across the surface of your coffee before taking a tentative sip. You wince. "Sugar in the—"

"I know where the sugar is." The words come out too fast, too sharp, cutting through the room like shrapnel. He didn’t mean it to sound like that. Hell, he doesn’t mean anything anymore, not the way it comes out.

The mug hits the counter harder than he intends, coffee sloshing up over the rim, spilling into the butter dish you forgot to put away after last night’s dinner. A droplet scalds his thumb.

You don’t flinch, don’t snap back. You just stand there, looking at him with that same maddening expression you always wear—half annoyed, half something softer. He doesn’t know what to do with it, that mix of exasperation and patience, like you know exactly who he is and still haven’t shoved him out of your life yet.

And this is it, he realizes. This is all the two of you will ever be. Two broken people, held together by duct tape and scar tissue, stuck in the same tired loop of half-measures and almosts. It’s almost funny. Almost.

Something heavy presses behind his eyes, an ache that rises fast and chokes him before he can think about it too hard. He needs to move. Needs to be anywhere but here.

He's dressed and out the door in under a minute, laces trailing, the screen door slamming behind him. You don't call out and he doesn't look back. That bubble between you, it's popped, shards of soap and air drifting in the pale morning.

He leaves his coffee on the counter, untouched. It’ll sit there, cooling to nothing. Just like everything else.

—

Summer settles heavy and dense, humidity pressing like a physical weight. The air hangs heavy, still, every breath a labor. Joel's shirt clings to his back, to the indent of his spine where sweat collects. He's got the windows down but the breeze brings no relief, heated air billowing useless and limp. A fly buzzes lazy loops around his ear and he smacks at it, palm colliding with his stubbled cheek. Three days’ growth. He keeps meaning to shave. Keeps meaning to do a lot of things.

The streetlights flicker on as he turns into your driveway, their dim yellow glow bleeding together in the thick twilight. The crunch of his tires on gravel feels deafening, like an intrusion, too loud for this quiet, empty hour. The porch is dark. The windows are dark. For a long moment, he doesn’t move. His hand stays on the gearshift, and his foot hovers over the pedal.

He could leave. He could put this rusted out hunk of metal in reverse and pretend he was never here. You would understand. You always do. It's what you’re good at, understanding and accepting and never pushing for more. And maybe that's why he keeps coming back, keeps sinking into your softness. Because he's a selfish fuck. And isn't that the worst truth.

He cuts the engine.

The porch creaks under his boots, a floorboard whining a warning, and he pauses with his fist poised to knock. When was the last time he even knocked? When had he decided that your space, your life, was just his to walk into? The thought sours in his stomach, but he doesn’t let himself step back. He raps once. Twice. The sound echoes dully in the muggy stillness.

For a moment, there’s nothing. Just silence and the weight of the heat pressing down on him. And he thinks wildly, fearfully, that maybe he waited too long. Maybe this is it. Maybe the universe is fresh out of second chances.

But then there’s the click of the lock turning, the soft creak of hinges, and there you are.

The light spilling out from the kitchen frames you in a weak halo, more shadow than glow. You’re barefoot, wearing cut-off sweatpants and a stretched-out t-shirt with a hole in the shoulder. Your hair is sticking to your damp temples, to the curve of your neck, and there’s a faint crease from your pillow etched into your cheek.

"Joel?" you say, voice scratchy from sleep. There’s something else in it, though—something sharper, something awake and alive. "What are you doing here?"

And there it is, a million dollar question. Why is he here? Why does he keep coming back to you, to this place, to the fragile thread of a connection that feels too thin to hold either of you? What is he hoping to find in the spaces between your heartbeats?

He swallows and it hurts.

"I don’t know," he says finally, his voice scraping out of him raw. "I just…"

His hand lifts, drops. He can’t finish the sentence, doesn’t even know how to start it.

You step forward, slow and deliberate, closing the distance between you until you’re right there in front of him. He can smell the sleep still clinging to you, the faint metallic tang of the diner that never quite washes off. He braces himself for what’s coming—for the slap, the curse, the moment when you finally shove him back and tell him to stay gone. He deserves all of it. He deserves worse.

But you don’t shove him. Your hand comes up, and it’s gentle as it rests against his jaw, your fingers tracing the line of bone like it’s something worth touching.

"You’re allowed to want something. You know that, right?"

His throat burns. His whole body feels like it’s cracking open under the weight of your words, like they’re carving through the hollow places inside him, the ones he’s spent so long trying to ignore. You make it sound so simple, like breathing, like wanting something—someone—isn’t the hardest goddamn thing in the world.

But you don’t look at him like he’s broken. You never have.

His voice shakes when it finally comes out, barely more than a rasp. "I want you."

And for a moment, he’s sure he’s ruined it. That he’s ruined you. This person who has already cracked themselves open for him a hundred times in a hundred quiet ways. But then you smile, just barely, just at the corners of your mouth.

"Okay," you say. "Okay."

You step back, your fingers catching briefly at the fabric of his shirt, tugging him into the dark of the house. The door clicks shut behind him, sealing the two of you inside this strange, fragile thing you keep building together. His hands find you—your waist, your hair, the damp curve of your neck—and you come easily, rising onto your toes as your mouth meets his.

It’s slow. Careful. He kisses you like he’s afraid to break you, like he’s afraid of breaking himself. Like maybe this moment could last forever if he just holds it still long enough. You taste like sleep and sweat and something familiar he doesn’t have a name for, something that feels like home even though he’s never believed in such a thing.

Tomorrow, the leaves will start to change. The world will keep turning, and the mess between you won’t magically fix itself. It never does. But tonight, it’s enough.

You’re enough.

Even if he never quite finds the words to tell you.

#main blog repost

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