#flatmate!eddie munson x reader | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

icallhimjoey · 2 years ago

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Only Temporary

♥ ♥ Joseph Quinn x Fem!Reader

Summary: Joe needs a temporary living space, and you happen to have a spare room to let. One plus one equals two, baby.

CW / disclaimer: rpf (don’t read if this makes you uncomfy), fem!reader, swearing (lots), so far fluff only

Author’s note: this is the fourth part out of five. I’ll add onto the summary as the story grows, if it needs it. If this is the first part you come across, go read the parts in order, I beg of you (ive gotten asks about this and its just... read all of it! you'll understand the story!). (rewritten on 15 nov 2023)

Wordcount: 4.1K

part one - part two - part three - part four - part five

As it turned out, Joe was an instant hit with your family.

Which, yea, of course, he was. But to be fair, any person you would’ve brought would’ve been the prefered guest over you.

This instant liking of Joe included your stepmother, who, from the moment he walked into the kitchen, shook her rubber-gloved hand, and passed her the bottle of champagne – “Stepmother? Surely not! You look like sisters!” – was eating out of his hand.

Blushing like a teenager, she poured him a drink in one of her best crystal glasses and never once told him to take his shoes off.

The rest of your family crowded around him, shaking hands, or in the case of your father, slapping him vigorously on the shoulder as if he was beating dust from a carpet.

Yea, they fucking loved him. And it had only been a minute.

Meanwhile, you were left to pour your own drink and weren’t allowed off the doormat until you had removed your boots.

Honestly, everyone made such a fuss over him that you almost felt miffed. You were waiting for the comments, or side-eyed glances at you for not bringing your friend, and instead bringing a stranger, a flatmate you hadn’t even bothered to tell your family you’d gotten, but none of those came.

You didn’t mind, you thought, but, upon closer inspection, you did mind, actually.

Joe didn’t steal attention the way your friend would have done.

She would’ve made an ass of herself and made a seemingly innocent but secretly nasty comment towards your stepmother, or your brother’s girlfriend.

She would’ve said the things everyone would silently be thinking and break the stiffness in the room you would so often feel when you were around these people.

But to be fair, it had been a while since you’d brought a boy over to meet your family. You thought back to when you’d introduced your last boyfriend and they had reacted similarly to how they were talking to Joe now.

They’re just being nice, you then thought.

“Wait,” you caught your brother narrowing his eyes at Joe, then doing a double take before snapping his fingers and pointing at him.

“Eddie fucking Munson?”

All eyes landed on Joe, you know, if they weren’t already on him, seeing as the shiny new toy in the room seemed to be eating up all the attention.

“Yea,” Joe smiled like a shy schoolboy and scratched the back of his neck.

“Oh, my God,” your brother’s eyes were about to pop out of his skull if they grew any larger.

No one else in the room really knew what was happening, but the excitement in your brother’s voice ate up the atmosphere.

“What?” you didn’t get it.

“Your flatmate’s an actor?” your brother looked at you, his big, excited eyes turned very judgemental towards you. It made you furrow your brow in further confusion.

How did he know Joe was an actor?

“Ooh, she has a type, doesn’t she?” your stepmother nudged your dad, and you wondered if it was scientifically possible to undergo some sort of surgery to be able to shoot real-life daggers from your eyes at her.

She’d serve right to leave your ex-boyfriend out of this. Out of everything. Forever.

“Babe!” you brother called out to his girlfriend who was in the kitchen.

“Oh shit,” he was quick to cover his mouth.

“She’s not finished watching it yet– no spoilers everyone!”

It would’ve been really cool if someone was going to clock you in on what they were talking about. Your brother noticed your confusion that hadn’t let up yet.

“Don’t tell me,” he swung an arm around your shoulders, and it made you want to hurt him physically.

Kick him in the shins.

This faux affection was only to smugly shove something into your face, you knew it, you’d lived with your brother long enough to see right through his tricks.

“You’ve not seen it, have you?”

You looked at Joe, suddenly scared you’d been living with the likes of someone like Tom Holland, or Tom Felton, or Tom Hiddleston.

Why all famous actors that came to mind were Tom’s, you weren’t sure.

Except you were, but it was something to dissect another time. Not right now, stood in your father’s living room with your three-week-old flatmate who suddenly seemed… different, to you.

“Seen what?” you scoffed.

“She hasn’t,” Joe answered your brother as if you weren’t in the room.

“Of course, she hasn’t,” you brother laughed, and Joe joined in.

You hated every second of it.

Your brother was quick to google Joe on his phone, and still under his arm, he showed you images of Joe on red carpets, in character, from photoshoots… it made you look up at Joe, utterly in shock.

Because, what the fuck?

Joe seemed a little flustered, uncomfortable almost, and you stepped forward to hit him in the arm with a fist. Got him right on the bicep, right on that line between muscles, where it really hurt.

“You could’ve said!”

“Wha–” Joe comically scoffed with big eyes and a smile, before shaking his head and scrunching his face at you.

How stupid would that conversation have been?

It took a minute to get over the initial shock of your family knowing Joe – it was just your brother and his girlfriend at first, but then when more people started arriving, it was your brother’s introduction of Joe to everyone that guaranteed that after dinner, everyone was aware that they were in the proximity of a celebrity.

In a house filled with people, not a single person had asked you about your work, or about your relationship status.

You were merely an afterthought and... yea, all right, you weren’t being subtle about it, so what about it? The lack of attention annoyed you to no end.

You were all huffd and puffs and glares and scoffs. Kept rolling your eyes at everyone a lot, too.

The only thing people were talking to you about was your flatmate. And you realised you didn’t really have answers to any of the questions they were asking you.

“What’s he working on now?” Not a clue.

“A movie?” Maybe.

“Or maybe a TV series?” Honestly, you didn’t know.

You’d seen Joe rehearse lines, but you’d never gotten close enough to actually hear what he’d been saying, too scared he’d ask you to help him out and read lines with him, like your ex-boyfriend used to do.

“How long will he be staying?” Actually, you weren’t sure about that either.

Joe’d said a month, but he’d also said six weeks. He could be halfway through his stay, or he could be walking out next week.

What you did tell people, was that it was only temporary.

He would leave as soon as they wrapped filming and saying that aloud to several family members made you miss Joe.

Already.

You could retch at yourself, it didn’t make any sense at all, but... that’s how you felt.

Cool time to realise it too, given your location and the people you were surrounded with.

Jesus.

“Why is he staying with you?” A rude question, but one that you’d started wondering yourself, now suddenly very aware that Joe could probably afford better accommodation for himself.

One without a hag of a flatmate, for one.

“I’m sorry,” you mouthed at Joe who was held in a death grip by one of your cousins as she slurred words into his ear.

Joe gave you a small smile before looking down, trying to focus on following whatever story he was being told by her.

That protectiveness- no, possessiveness you felt when your best friend first met Joe and kept flirting, had found its way back into the pit of your stomach.

Your cousin was a nice girl, but this didn’t sit right with you at all. When you caught Joe’s eye again, you nodded towards the garden, and you saw Joe excuse himself and wiggle free from what to him were stranger’s hands as he followed you out.

Outside, Joe took a deep breath and immediately reached for the packet of cigarettes in his pocket.

“Give me one,” you demanded and held your hand out. Joe froze for a second and eyed you curiously.

“You don’t smoke,”

“I’m a social smoker. We’re at a party. Give me one,” you sounded stressed out as you shook your open palm at him until he obliged and handed you a cigarette.

You made eye-contact as Joe held out a lit lighter for you to use, and Joe could feel your breath on his fingers.

“Your family’s nice,” he then said, after lighting his own cigarette.

You scoffed at him.

Sure, they were nice. To him, maybe.

“My family’s a lot, I think is what you meant to say,”

“Those aren’t mutually exclusive,” Joe laughed, and, you sort of felt bad for him.

“Honestly, I’m sorry, but I’ve tried warning you-”

“It’s fine,” Joe smiled warmly at you. “I’m having fun.”

A silence fell where you both puffed at your cigarettes, and you took a few slow steps into the dark garden.

“Are you?” Joe then asked, following you.

“Hmm… define fun,”

Another silence fell, and you could feel the air grow awkward between you. Then something clicked inside your head.

“So, Eddie Munson, was it? Are you... are you fucking serious, Joe? Eddie?” you referenced your cat. The one that had taken such a strong liking to Joe, you weren’t sure how he’d cope once Joe moved out.

Joe grinned.

“And you didn’t think to mention that at all?” you grew playful in your motions, reaching a small patio at the back of the garden, just beside the shed that still held your old bike.

“What would I have said?” Joe defended, and you agreed. “You asked a lot of questions, but my work didn’t come up, so I didn’t think it was important.”

True. You hadn’t even thought of asking him about his job until after he’d moved in already.

Joe was right, there was no way that chat could’ve gone well.

You imagined Joe telling you about one of his characters and the only reaction you could think to have was to shove him out the door immediately.

You’d have never let him move into your spare room had you known beforehand.

“Well... you could’ve at least let me know that my new flatmate’s been on covers of magazines and that,”

You tried to think how you had been able to not have known, and the answer was simple. You never really set foot outside of your flat with Joe.

There’d been no way for you to see how others reacted to him.

You also didn’t really consume much new media. You were still stuck watching romantic comedies from the 90s and early 2000’s whenever you felt like watching TV. Just, something about Hugh Grant and his stuttery, idiotic, beautiful self, you know?

“I did say I was an actor, and you’ve not exactly shown much interest to be fair,” Joe pointedly said before taking a long drag from his cigarette.

You couldn’t help but think he was attractive like this.

He was right.

You’d very muchly refrained from asking questions about Joe’s profession, simply because you didn’t like what he did. You felt a pang of guilt; it would’ve been polite of you have at least asked some surface level questions.

“So,” Joe loudly said, blowing out smoke into the darkness. “I heard you have a type?”

You immediately wanted the ground to swallow you up.

“I don’t,” It was quick out of your mouth.

For a second, you didn’t want to explain yourself further. Let him guess at what your stepmother had meant when she’d made the comment earlier. But Joe didn’t speak and gave you questioning eyes, and you succumbed far too easily to his silent pleads.

“My ex-boyfriend was an actor,” you winced, and it made Joe raise his eyebrows up high.

“Oh? Anything I would’ve seen him in?” it was a question Joe had gotten all night, and one that your brother had answered for him every single time.

Joe now asking you the same thing made you laugh out loud.

“No. Well, there was the one Go Compare ad he did,” you thought back to how proud he’d been to land a TV ad. And then how pissed off he’d been when you’d made fun of him for it.

Come on, Go Compare? It was the funniest thing you’d ever heard.

“But no, I don’t think so. It was a lot of long evenings reading lines with him and helping him do self-tapes, and then having to pay all of his bills because he wasn’t landing anything,” you took a sharp breath before sarcastically adding,

“Great memories.”.

“Yea, well,” Joe pulled the corners of his mouth down and cocked his head to the side. “It’s a tough business.”

Another silence lingered. It was a little chilly outside, but you noticed that your body was glowing on the side closest to Joe. Good thing you were fairly sober still, otherwise you might have mistaken it for a crush.

“Hey-” Joe started. “Are you a good-” You spoke at the same time.

Both of you were interrupted by the patio doors opening.

“Shit,” you hissed and were quick to step behind the shed to hide.

“Hello?” someone called out as you were frantically waving over Joe to hide behind the shed with you.

When he didn’t, you lurched forward, grabbed him by the collar and pulled him into you until you were both out of sight of whatever family member had stepped into the garden.

In the shadows, with two lit cigarettes still, you held a finger over your own mouth, signaling for Joe to keep quiet.

“What are we doing?” Joe whispered, but you made big angry eyes at him.

You were stood very close together, and your grip on Joe’s collar remained strong. Joe could smell your perfume, and even though your eyes looked heated, what he could see of them in the dark looked beautiful. He could lie to himself and say he hadn’t noticed them before, but he had. Being so close to you now, kissing-distance, honestly, just meant he had no way of denying how beautiful he thought you looked.

“I thought I saw them step out,” your family member spoke to someone inside before the patio doors closed again and you sighed with relief.

“Thank God,” you let go of Joe and stepped around him to peek around the corner of the shed to see that you’d been left alone.

You looked back at Joe, who was giving you a look as if to say you'd gone insane.

“They don’t know I smoke,” you simply said, and if Joe hadn’t gotten the full picture of your position within this family, this surely did it.

You finished the cigarette and looked around to see where you could hide the bud. You ended up throwing it over the hedge where you knew it’d land in an alleyway.

“Give me another,” you then said, not ready to go back inside yet, and saw that Joe was still stood behind the shed, eyeing you from the shadow that made it hard for you to read his face.

“Are you sure you want to risk it? Might lose out on some pocket money if your dad sees,” Joe then said sarcastically holding one up for you.

You thought back to how your parents had gotten their best parenting in when they’d caught your older brother sneaking cigarettes into the house at sixteen. Ever since they you knew that you’d absolutely be in for it if they’d ever catch you with one.

You knew it was weird that you operated on something you’d seen happen when you were nine years old, but, alas. It was what it was, and you could never let your family know you sometimes enjoyed inhaling literal tar.

You snatched the cigarette from his hands and noticed when you held out a hand for the lighter, that Joe wouldn’t just give it to you, didn’t just hand it over, but instead lit it again for you to lean in closer to him like he’d done before.

It gave you a better look at his hands, and you felt the muscles in your stomach tighten.

Oh, no.

Shit.

You took a long drag and hummed as you exhaled, trying your best to keep the air between you and Joe light and casual, ignoring whatever it was you felt brewing inside.

Because something was definitely brewing inside.

It was a good thing you hadn’t asked for a cigarette from Joe when he’d just moved in. You’d have developed a cough by now if you had.

“Am I a good what?” Joe suddenly asked.

“Huh?” you’d spoken too soon, because the second the word left your mouth, you knew what Joe meant.

You were about to ask him something when you’d been interrupted by a family member stepping out into the garden.

“Oh, yes. Are you a good football player?” you asked, raising your eyebrows at him in question, face all serious, no hint of banter.

The question threw Joe off completely.

Was this your idea of flirting?

“Because I’ll trade you for another player if you’re not.”

You hadn’t told Joe about the football game your family would always play on Sunday mornings. It was a rite of passage: Sunday mornings on the beach meant a game of football before you were allowed near the breakfast table.

None of you were any good, but it was the one thing you always enjoyed when visiting your dad on a weekend.

Even when you were hungover.

Even when it would be shitty weather.

Even when bloody injured – you thought back to a time when your uncle in a wheelchair with a broken foot had been forced to be a goalie on your team one time – whoever stayed the night on a Saturday would be called out of bed and be dragged out onto the sand the following Sunday to have a go at kicking a ball back and forth.

You liked it even more because you knew your stepmother really didn’t like the tradition that your family had started when you were younger and your parents had still been together.

So, the next morning, when you were harshly awoken by your father opening your bedroom door and flicking on the lights to illuminate the two of you in your wooden bunkbeds, you hung your head over the side to look down at Joe in his bunk.

“Good morning,” you said through squinty eyes, hair cascading down the steps of the ladder.

“You ready for this?”

You knew he wasn’t which, if anything, brought you great joy.

The skies were grey overhead, but it wasn’t cold at all, and bar a lone person walking their dog, you were the only ones on your patch of beach. You had decided you didn’t want to be on Joe’s team, but more so because you didn’t want to be on your brother’s team, and he insisted he wanted to play with Joe rather than against him.

One of your brother’s friends had made his way over too, and you decided that he could be your best teammate.

Your brother immediately claimed the game was rigged as he put together the plastic tubes of one of the little goals, but you dad was quick to shut him up.

For teams to be equal, you dad had been made the referee and you grinned at Joe from your side of the field before it all kicked off.

Joe didn’t know what he was in for: none of your family were known to play a fair game.

In fact, the aim was more to prevent the other team from playing a normal game of football at all.

It was a game of football with rugby rules. Sort of. A contact sport, as far as all of you were concerned.

When both goals were in place, your dad threw the ball into the game and you were quick to launch yourself at your brother in order to take him out.

Absolutely not what Joe was expecting to happen.

Toppling over in the sand, Joe threw up both his hands at the two of you and looked at your father to see if he was going to say something.

He didn't.

This wasn’t how Joe thought you played football.

But you wrestled your brother in the sand and shrieked at his friend when you saw a cousin dive for his ankles.

Luckily, he was fast, and when his feet found the ball, was quick to score a goal. You cheered, and you saw your dad hold a hand towards your side of the make-shift field.

“One, nill!”

“Get with it, Quinn,” you shouted, walking backwards to your side of the pitch, as you high-fived your teammates.

Joe caught on fast, though.

This was a feral version of football; a weird mix of footy and rugby, but no rules, apparently. Very hands-on.

It was how your family had played ever since you were little and you couldn't match up against the adults playing. You and your brother would just launch yourself at their feet and hold onto their legs until adults started hurling themselves at each other too.

You were allowed to kick a ball into a goal whilst holding someone's limbs tightly against their body, trying to swipe their feet from under their body to take them down.

You honestly believed this was how all football matches should be played - it was so much more fun than just kicking a ball across the beach feet only.

When you finally got hold of the ball midway through the game, Joe ran over and grabbed hold of both your arms behind you. Digging his feet in the sand and leaning back, he prevented you from taking any more steps, but you weren’t easy and wiggled your hands free. This prompted Joe to grab hold of your waist, and it only took a second for the two of you to hit the sand beneath you, screaming as you did.

You were laughing when Joe yelled for your brother who swiftly ran over and took the ball.

“No!” you cried when your brother scored a goal, and Joe finally let go of you.

Joe got up and looked at you as you laid on your back still, completely out of breath, with pieces of hair stuck in your mouth.

Still pretty, Joe thought, as he held out his hand for you to grab to help you up.

You’d forgotten how scraped up you could get from Sunday morning football on the beach.

The amount of tackling and falling you’d done had really done a number on your knees and elbows, but it was all overlooked, because in the end your father concluded your team to be the winning one.

Entirely unfair.

For the last few goals, he hadn’t even been paying attention.

It had resulted in a huge pile up on top of your dad, after which no one argued as you all made your way back to the house for breakfast high on endorphins.

Joe wondered why you disliked your family so much - this was the most fun he'd had in a good while.

When back at the house, you noticed Joe’s knees looked worse for wear too.

“Come on, we need to get the sand out,” you said and nodded your head for him to follow you up the stairs to the bathroom.

“Any more scraped knees?” you called, not to make it too weird that you’d be slipping off to upstairs with Joe by yourself, but no one else joined you.

Both still fully dressed, you stepped into the bath and used the shower head to rinse your legs free from sand, doing your very best not to get your clothes wet.

For a second you thought Joe was going to fuck around and spray you, but the look you gave him, along with a stern, “Don’t!” made him reel it back in.

One of your knees in particular looked gnarly. There were a bunch of tiny little scrapes on your skin that, all clustered together, made quite the patch.

“I hope you weren’t planning on wearing a dress today,” Joe commented when he saw you dab at it with a facecloth.

“Huh?” Why should he care what you wore today?

“For your date, tonight?” Joe said kindly, his voice soft in case you didn’t want your family to hear.

“Oh.”

You then realized you’d completely forgotten about your neighbour Tom.

“Yea.”

---

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